Source
r/socialism•
Le7

Why does CPUSA and the various socialist parties in the United States defend religion?

It sickens me quite frankly. Marx was very clear on his stance when it came to religion. Everywhere religion exists it exploits and manipulates the people. How on earth can these people claim to be socialists when they defend practitioners of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, etc etc etc?

I understand that under the current US constitution we must respect the freedom of religion, but I don't understand why I keep seeing people carrying red banners in one hand and holding up a sign essentially saying "let's be liberal appeasers to these muslims, christians, and all other breed of theist"

Posted Oct 14, 2011, 4:46 AM UTC

448
tmcroissantChristian Social Democrat•

I'm religious and a socialist. Deal with it bigot.

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anticapitalistVeganarchist•

I'm religious and a socialist. Deal with it bigot.

Welcome. However it's unfair to call someone a bigot for judging your choice to believe in unmeasurable faiths.

If someone from another faith is insulting your faith, that's basically bigotry/racism.

An atheist/scientist being critical of unscientific views is not bigotry. However, we can always focus on what's important (socialism) and be more tolerant of each other's personal lives.

It should be obvious, however, that the capitalist movement preys on religious people, who're more biased towards believing things without evidence. The whole capitalist-utopia-faith is harder to sell to an atheist. However, we'll still need to get the religious anti-capitalist movement to grow. I just mean, I want to be tolerant of left-wing religious people, but it's still true that religion overall has resulted in a lot of awful religious leaders. I can't ignore that.

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dezmodium•

It isn't unfair at all. A bigot is a person who judges others based on preconceived notions, not on the actions or deeds of the individual. He called the guy a bigot because he is a bigot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigotry

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anticapitalistVeganarchist•

Your comment is silly, & your understanding of bigotry is wrong. You're giving me a wikipedia link like I've never heard of bigotry- that's an attempt to insult me. An atheist's criticism of religion is not bigotry, but a rational argument that people should have evidence for the things they believe in. Faith, by definition, is believing without evidence. It is blatantly illogical, & I am not a bigot for saying how we should have evidence for the things we believe, not faith.

Religion vs religion criticism is usually just racism- a person born into one group insulting another. People who prefer science, and choose science over religion are not comparable to that.

Lastly, under a truly simplistic definition of bigotry- like showing intolerance of any group - then we're all bigots. Aren't we bigots against murderers and thieves? Obviously simple definitions like that are useless.

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dezmodium•

My understanding of bigotry is literal and in line with common understanding. You are the one who seems to be unclear on the meaning of the word. Bigotry is not the strawman you set up where we label those bigots who we disagree with. I defined it and supported my definition, which you clearly disregarded to your own disadvantage. The only useless simple definition of the term is the one you used.

Bigotry can very well be present in criticism, and bigots often hide behind this lame excuse, so spare me. This person rolls out of the gate throwing accusations of manipulation, and appeasement to both religious people and those who might defend them in the same rant. This isn't fair, and it is certainly from a the stereotypes the submitter has already formed in their head.

So tell me, which part of

Everywhere religion exists it exploits and manipulates the people.

or

"let's be liberal appeasers to these muslims, christians, and all other breed of theist"

is rational, objective thought?

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Le7OP•

Bigotry toward the religious leadership and institutions is encouraged in Marxism. You obviously have never read the Communist manifesto.

Bigotry toward a changeable thing like religion is a morally good thing as it encourages a person to improve themselves. The social gospel and liberation theology movements were better than typical christianity, but they only advocated the freedom of the masses from their economic chains. They were still slaves to their religious leaders, their god, and their religion.

Iran has a mostly socialist economy, but the clerics still enslave them. They even claim to own the Iranian people.

-4
redryanMarxist-Leninist-Star Trek•

I have no interest in a Victorian literature pissing match on this issue other than to say that neither Marx nor Engels ever took an approach even resembling your pigheaded and one dimensional attitude towards faith, which they most certainly appreciated as a deeply complex and contradictory social phenomenon. You sound like Christopher Hitchens and that means you need to go back to the drawing board on all of these ideas.

Iran has a mostly socialist economy, but the clerics still enslave them. They even claim to own the Iranian people.

Now this makes me certain that you need to go back to the drawing board. Iran has a "socialist economy?" If you think that socialism is 'the state does some stuff in the economy,' which is the only inference that makes sense here, you should probably read that manifesto a few more times.

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[deleted]•

Iran has a mostly socialist economy, but the clerics still enslave them. They even claim to own the Iranian people.

As an Iranian communist, this caused much guffaw. Iran is an imperialist state and is far from socialism!!!

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Le7OP•

I shouldn't have said mostly socialist. It has aspects of it, more so than the USA, but you're right - it isn't a socialist state. My apologies.

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dezmodium•

What is "mostly socialist"? Like their capitalists only "mostly" extract excess value from the working class? You are spouting nonsense.

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[deleted]•

[deleted]

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ilethimgo•

"Breed of theist"?

Easy tiger. They are still human. And Marx called it what it was, an opiate, a painkiller, a distraction, so let them have it. What harm does it do us?

If you want non-dictatorial communism or socialism, freedom of religion, speech, and press must come with it.

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Le7OP•

Speech and press: Yes, absolutely. Freedom of religion: No. Religion runs counter to freedom in every situation its in. The concept of freedom of religion is masochism in itself and we're witnessing that in the modern day all over the world - the United States included.

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ilethimgo•

So say whatever you want, just nothing about religion? Not free speech, is it?

People need to have their own distractions, and statistics show time and again that religion thrives when it is actively persecuted. It would be counter productive to your goals. Forgetting momentarily that your ideal is at least fifty to one hundred years in the future (Americans won't vote for a socialist, and won't vote for an atheist, much less a candidate who openly seeks to end religious freedom).

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[deleted]•

That's incredibly arrogant, not to mention that it's just pure fascism.

The reason we see religion today represented as Bachmann and O'Donnel, is because religion is, in reality, at its very core, a powerful threat to this system. If it's going to be on the public's mind, it's got to be an apocalyptic circus of hatred. But the truth is that religion is, and had been, a powerful liberating force -- no less than secularism, and in fact sometimes more.

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redryanMarxist-Leninist-Star Trek•

Because of stuff like this.

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[deleted]•

Its because we want a fighting chance at recruiting a sizable party. Sadly, most people are religious. Just because they live a lie and have no idea it is all bullshit, they still might have socialist ideas and might have a fighting chance at waking up and joining the cause.

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Le7OP•

I understand, but I feel we are weakening ourselves in the long run by not promoting atheism. We've already got the moral high ground in our rejection of both individual and corporate greed.

Instead of letting the people buy into the idea that Jesus was the son of god, we should be engaging in charitable works on a mass scale while promoting socialism. Give the miserable a taste of what socialism can provide them. If the people look to us for moral guidance instead of their priests, pastors, imams, or rabbis then we've conquered a major hurdle.

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AristotleJr•

I completely disagree with you sir. If you are condescending to people's sincerest beliefs, you will go nowhere. You have to make yourselves as inclusive as possible. Also, socialists aren't slavishly devoted to Marx's every word, otherwise we'd be a religion too. We're a broad church, if you'll pardon the pun.

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[deleted]•

I don't think Marx wanted an atheistic society, just an irreligious one.

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[deleted]•

http://higherintellect.info/texts/thought_and_writing/philosophy/Cohen-If%20You're%20a%20Egalitarian.pdf

Read chapter 5, first few paragraphs. You're not reading your Marx correctly.

As a general rule, also, modern religions have slowly evolved to accommodate more leftist views. They do this or they know they'll perish. Some even believe that their religious views actually are more correct if they accommodate leftist views. Whether or not they are right about the existence of god is irrelevant to the discussion.

Being tolerant of religions that are ever changing is not something we should concern ourselves over. The moment they are pro-life, then we might have a fight.

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[deleted]•

You need to escape (') that apostrophe for the link to work or put it in the [text](link) format.

This one should work.

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[deleted]•

Thanks!

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devosdk•

Um, maybe because it is a First Amendment right? I'm an atheist member of CPUSA, but I still like freedoms for all. Marxism is only a building block of modern socialism, not dogma.

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Le7OP•

Have you ever wondered why modern socialism doesn't seem to ever take root? Its because we've veered so far from the ideology of Marxism and treat it only as a building block.

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devosdk•

Now you sound like a conservative, sticking to something written for a different time. The world evolves, and socialism must evolve with it. We cannot be found to be defending something based in a world without internet, without modern international politics.

Marxism is a key doctrine for the construction of a socialist reformation, but without Lenin, Krushchev, Mao, Nehru, or Gerry Adams, socialism would have been simply a theory.

Socialism has already developed over the years. Don't pretend that it'd be better to return to the 19th century.

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[deleted]•

First of all, there's obviously a huge difference between defending practitioners of religion and defending the religion itself. You seem to think criticizing religion requires attacking religious believers. It's like when conservatives say, "Oh how come you guys on the left criticize Christianity and then defend Muslims?" Defending Muslims from bigotry is not the same as defending Islam. Criticizing Christianity is not the same as attacking Christians, who should also be defended when they're victims of bigotry, whatever you think of their beliefs.

Marx's famous passage from A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right:

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.

Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower. The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun. Religion is only the illusory Sun which revolves around man as long as he does not revolve around himself.

His point isn't that religion is simply "bad." The point is that religion is a symptom of real world suffering and alienation. You can't deal with the symptom without going to the real causes. To the extent Marxists criticize religion, it's not to attack religious believers, it's to understand and address the real problems that religious sentiment expresses in a distorted form.

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Le7OP•

To interpret "The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions." as anything other than a call to abolish the institutions of religion is just reaching for something that simply is not there.

I agree with you when you say that the individuals within the religion should be defended and I never said otherwise. We SHOULD, on the other hand, be bigoted towards the religious institutions that they are a part of so that their children will not be in the same situation as they are.

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[deleted]•

I agree with you when you say that the individuals within the religion should be defended and I never said otherwise.

Umm, your original comment:

How on earth can these people claim to be socialists when they defend practitioners of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, etc etc etc?

...kind of of implied otherwise.

I don't know what exactly you mean by abolishing the institutions of religion. If you just mean, as I think Marx meant, being ruthlessly critical and honest about the reactionary role that religious institutions play, and the way religious illusions divert people from fighting real earthly wrongs, then yeah I agree. If you mean justifying state repression of religion or persecution of religious followers, then I think that's crazy, not to mention completely counterproductive.

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Le7OP•

I worded it poorly. I don't advocate attacking the person, but the religion being practiced by the person.

I think that we should be, as you say, ruthlessly critical, of religious institutions. I also think that we should repress religious practices that are overtly counter productive to society as a whole though. IE. the idea that gays are committing a sin against god or that women should be second class citizens (just two examples of many).

I don't advocate persecution for any religious followers as they are innocent - just caught up in the lies of religion that has been funneled into their minds.

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dezmodium•

"The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions."

You are putting the cart before the horse. He is making the claim the other way around. Convince the people to overthrow capitalism and institute a better system, and they will be happier and not need to rely on religion for their happiness.

In other words, to paraphrase the second sentence, to ask them to give up their religious hopes, you have to fulfill their real hopes (abolish the condition that was causing them suffering without hope, i.e. capitalism).

See?

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[deleted]•

Why is individual liberty all of the sudden not important to you?

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Le7OP•

To allow religion to propagate its lies and keep its people in blind ignorance is NOT supporting individual liberty. I care about individual liberty much more than most.

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[deleted]•

I guess what we need to talk about then is what you mean by individual liberty. Have you ever read John Locke's "A Letter Concerning Toleration." In this letter Locke is promoting a support of individual liberty and tolerance of the minority religious views or lack there of.

First, a state ban on religion like you're implying would be rather ineffective because you just can't coerce people to hold different beliefs. (notice I say coerce, not dialogue or convince.) This works both ways, you can't coerce secularism nor religiosity, because it will produce a counter-reaction that will be overall harmful. Instead it's best to acknowledge and make more rigid the separation of church and state.

Second, if there is a strict law made banning religion and upholding the tenets of another ideology, the actions to uphold these tenets by a population will be empty and in turn the actions of martyrs will be much more powerful.

Instead of blaming religion or support tolerance, a great dialogue needs to be started to unite the struggles of Christians, Jews, and Atheists a like.

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AristotleJr•

If you believe that, you should watch this talk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTi5NlWKlio

Also, 'appeasers'. I think you have a very odd idea of what religion is about. I don't honestly think religion is a particularly big hurdle, it is the structure of society which is the problem.

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platypuspracticus•

What would you do? Ban religion? Make martyrs and urban legends of them?

All that you can do is show religion the respect it earns. If there's validity somewhere, respect it. If there isn't, show it no respect. And always distrust it since it is a tool of manipulation and power centralization.

Edit: What I'm trying to say is that prohibition of religion would go over as well as any other prohibition...but most likely worse. Freedom of religion is a must. And that's coming from an atheist.

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dezmodium•

First of all, Marx didn't look at religion the way you ascribe. He saw it as a symptom of a larger problem. One could even argue that the way religion is practiced was the point of his contention, not even necessarily belief in a god or gods in itself.

Second of all, here in American there is a long tradition of Christian Socialism, for which, as an atheist, I would gladly welcome them to work beside us for a common cause. Hey, they believe. I don't. It's no big deal, we are both working towards the same things in this physical world. The theological debate is reserved for another arena.

Our socialist christian and muslim brothers and sisters (and everyone else, too!) deserve an outstretched hand from non-religious socialists and vice-versa. To me, trying to drive the wedge between the working class as you are doing here, is the real problem.

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Bab5crusadeA Trot in the IWW. How crazy is that? •

Not all religion is bad. Bah look at Deism, Buddhism, and Jainism. Deists don't really care about god since they don't believe a god is involved in our lives anymore. Buddhists tend to more supportive to Socialist causes due to Capitalism promoting suffering. Jainism? Well they just want peace.

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Bab5crusadeA Trot in the IWW. How crazy is that? •

BTW Tibet's current Dalai Lama calls himself a Marxist.

"Of all the modern economic theories, the economic system of Marxism is founded on moral principles, while capitalism is concerned only with gain and profitability. (...) The failure of the regime in the former Soviet Union was, for me, not the failure of Marxism but the failure of totalitarianism. For this reason I still think of myself as half-Marxist, half-Buddhist." Tenzin Gyatso

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_socialism

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Le7OP•

Deism is essentially agnosticism. I wouldn't call it religion.

Buddhism is a horrible religion - responsible for many deaths and enslavement of millions throughout history - In comparison to other far eastern religions, the only one worse is Hinduism. Some sects of Buddhism maintained the caste system that they got from Hinduism - the Caste system is social darwinism, an effect of capitalism.

Jainism is peaceful, yes, but the brainwashing that is done to members of the community is horrific. Children and adults alike terrified to accidentally step on an ant.

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Bab5crusadeA Trot in the IWW. How crazy is that? •

Buddhism kills MILLIONS of people? Really? Who, What, When, and Where? Yes, has been there deaths due to some elements of Buddhism? Yes. Why we are human? In Sir Lanka, the war was fought for nationalism and culture and not mainly religion. It was all started due to a rebellion minority which the ruling government opprosed.

There is no Buddhist caste system. The Buddha OPPOSED the caste system. This is why the Buddha said no to Hinduism is the caste system.

"At the time of the Buddha the caste system was firmly established in India. According to this system, a person's position in society was determined from the time he was born and there was no way to change his lot in life. There were four castes, or classes, of people in society:

The Brahmins or priests, who claimed to be the highest caste and the purest of peoples The warriors The merchants and traders The untouchables, who were considered the lowest class. They became workers and servants who did all the menial jobs, and were treated as slaves. The Buddha condemned the caste system, which he considered unjust. He pointed out that there existed wicked and cruel people as well as virtuous and kind people in every caste. Any person who had committed a crime would be punished accordingly by his karma no matter what caste he belonged to. He said a person may be considered to have come from a high or low caste according to his good and bad deeds. Therefore, according to the Buddha it is the good and bad actions of a person and not his birth that should determine his caste.

The Buddha introduced the idea of placing a higher value on morality and the equality of people instead of on which family or caste a person is born into. This was also the first attempt to abolish discrimination and slavery in the history of mankind.

The Buddha said:

By birth one is not an outcaste, By birth one is not a Brahmin; By deeds alone one is an outcaste, By deeds alone one is a Brahmin http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/buddhism/lifebuddha/2_24lbud.htm "

There is some areas in Buddhists countries where Caste is still used, but that is mainly due to Hindu's influence in the area.

"Buddhists The Buddha specifically denounced the caste system and there was no practice of caste amongst his immediate followers. So the rest of this section has a questionable status. The Buddhists also had a caste system. In Sri Lanka, the Rodis might have been outcast by the Sri Lankan Buddhists due to the absence of ahimsa (non-violence), a central tenet of Buddhism, among their beliefs. The writer Raghavan notes, "That a form of worship in which human offerings formed the essential ritual would have been anathema to the Buddhist way of life goes without saying; and it needs no stretch of imagination that any class of people in whom the cult prevailed or survived even in an attenuated form would have been pronounced by the sangha (i.e. the Buddhist clergy) as exiles from the social order." Savarkar believed that the status of the backward castes (e.g. Chamar) that performed non-violence[clarification needed] only worsened.[58] When Ywan Chwang traveled to South India after the period of the Chalukyan Empire, he noticed that the caste system had existed among the Buddhists and Jains.[59] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India#Reforms"

If there is any caste system left. It needs to be removed and destroyed.

I think you got your knowledge wrong here.

People who kill in the name of Buddhism should never be called Buddhism.

As long people keep there religion to them selves, do good, and keep it out of government. I see no issues of religion in a socialist or communist society.

Organised religion is the trouble maker.

1
Le7OP•

"People who kill in the name of Buddhism should never be called Buddhists."

You sound like a muslim or christian apologist, just with buddhism.

In regards to the caste system: http://www.buddhanet.net/e-learning/dharmadata/fdd53.htm

Buddha can claim all he wants about the Caste system. His followers practiced it after his death and to this very day. Jesus and Muhammad said a lot of things that could be conceived as good and moral too, but that doesn't change the crimes done in their religion's names.

Tibetan Buddhism is the worst type though. It is where the slavery comes from which existed up until chinese conquest of Tibet. The Tibetans are better off under chinese rule than they were under the rule of the Buddhist clergy, but they are still second class citizens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bP_IohMUWaY

Nat Geo

When it comes to killing millions of people just take a look at the Tibetan conquests of China. They enslaved or killed many people. Revisionist history has been written by Buddhists that Buddhism made the Tibetans tranquil, but don't buy into it. Its as false as an evangelical saying the USA isn't a secular nation. Currently: theravadans are waging holy war against Muslims in Thailand (although its not purely the Theravadan's faults - its shared responsibility in this case). Lots of religious violence between muslims and buddhists in Indonesia occurs as well.

Religion is a tool for the elites to oppress the ignorant. This is a nearly universal quality that all religions have - Buddhism is no exception. Its arguably one of the best examples of it right behind Christianity Islam and Judaism.

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Bab5crusadeA Trot in the IWW. How crazy is that? •

Religion did some horrible shit and so did Communism and Socialism. Did we all stop being socialists for what Mao or Stalin did?

BTW, I am a Buddhist/Atheist. I'm Buddhist because I believe we live in a world of suffering, but I don't support any of the superstitious parts of it.

I follow this guy's Buddhism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Batchelor_(author)

2
CharioteerOutSDS (nontendency)•

Attacking religion serves no purpose, I would say that you're good as long as they're taxed, and they are out of government. BONUS; schools teach accurate science, well-rounded history and secular ethics.

1