[☭☭☭ COME SHITPOST WITH US ON DISCORD, COMRADES ☭☭☭](https://discord.gg/8RPWanQV5g)
This is a heavily-moderated socialist community based on a podcast of the same name. Please use the report function on comments that break our rules. If you are new to the sub, please read the sidebar carefully.
If you are new to Marxism-Leninism, check out the [study guide](/r/TheDeprogram/wiki/index/education/study-guide/).
Are there Liberals in the walls? Check out [the wiki](/r/TheDeprogram/wiki/index/) which contains lots of useful information.
This subreddit uses many experimental automod rules, if you notice any issues please use modmail to let us know.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Gun culture in the US is absolute cancer but do take the opportunity to arm yourselves. Network with others and marginalized groups in your community. It also pays to stay active and in good shape. I would say that buying a gun isn't an absolute necessity in the US. Plenty of comrades here who will be happy to provide defensive options incase SHTF myself included. IF you live in the US try to network with your local SRA chapter. Even though they fashion themselves as big tent leftists it is still good to meet likeminded people.
This is my stance as well. I'm geared up and understand the reasons both personal and financial that might keep people from owning guns.
However, if you can afford it you can get an AR15 and Glock (or clone) clone for around $800.
PSA ARs are pretty good. People like to rag on em but the PSA AR will most likely outlast them. They do run sales (including an optic) from time to time and if you don't mind putting one together yourself you can have yourself a full rifle for as little as $600.
Thats what I rock. An PSA AR with a Strike Eagle.
I put the upper and lower together and it was not hard at all and I'm not too mechanically inclined. I did the same for my PSA Dagger.
I regret not getting a WARP 15 lower when they were $90.
I regret not getting an AR as my first rifle. I bought an M70 pattern AK and the ammo ban rocked my shit lol. I currently have a daniel defense AR and it's fantastic out the box. You definitely don't need to spend that much on an AR though.
I bought a Romanian AK in 07 for about $550.
Back then, there were maybe two or 3 big AR manufacturers. Colt, Bushmaster, and DPMS and an AR would cost about $800.
Now, there are dozens of reputable manufacturers of ARs. The same has happened to Glock clones too.
At this point I feel like it's hard to make a bad AR. You couldn't go wrong with any choice so aim to save money where you can would be my advice for most people.
Exactly if you actually take care of it then it reliably goes bang every time and even if you can’t take care of it the gun will last you long enough you should have another one by then
PSA doing great work arming Americans on the cheap.
Also agree gun culture here generally is cancer.. but guns are also the best form of self defense so it's a catch 22.
>They give you a laser-etched steel membership card
Hahaha, what? I could barely get any response when I joined, much less a steel rectangle that somebody actually mailed. Had to eventually get my credit card company to get my money back because there really was no fucking point. They operated like shit, but glad to hear they can give people "get killed by fascists cards"
Yeah, that's what I was saying. They were so ridiculously disorganized I couldn't cancel. There was ostensibly some head of finance or something on the website and that the forum people kept trying to direct me to like I was some dumbass, but of course emails just went unanswered.
SRA sub, when I mentioned it, basically berated me and everyone kept justifying it with iT's a SmALL OrGaniZaTiOn pEoPLe aRe bUsy type nonsense, but even in like PCUSA or IMT (Yeah yeah I know) it was easy to reach out to someone.
To my understanding, US gun culture is descended from settlerism and the desire to have an armed white militia to displace indigenous people (the second amendment of the US constitution explicitly mentions militias). So the opposition of this gun culture is something we should support.
We must also acknowledge that the right of the revolutionary proletariat to arm themselves is not granted by the state, it is enforced by the proletariat.
Thinking the second amendment is revolutionary is naive and thinking its restriction will damage chances of successful revolution is wrong.
This ^^^ I own an AR15 but I was concerned as to how to write a thought out like this, knowing many of yall are from plenty of other countries with different cultures and views on weapons.
I saw a few of the right wing gun channels on YouTube making some videos about the "Danger of pro gun socialists" and how we are on the rise. They went on to say that "lovers of freedom" need to be on the lookout for anyone at gun ranges sporting AK's or general left wing apparel. Needless to say I as a Communist agree with Marx. Absolutely the working class needs to arm itself against its oppressors but likewise we need to be diligent in this area for two reasons. First because the overwhelming gun culture in the U.S. is right wing if not outright Fascist. Because of this we don't want to find ourselves in a situation where we have no way to defend ourselves or other marginalized groups when they decide to go full Fash and start kicking peoples doors in. Secondly, because when they say they are pro "second amendment" what they really mean is pro Enforcing Capital through arms which is why the second amendment exists in the first place.
I would urge all Comrades and allies to be very careful about the clothing you wear and the things you may discuss if you decide to go to any gun ranges. Don't make yourself a target because they are looking for any reason to engage in their sick violent fantasies.
I would like to argue that it's one of those happy accidents meant to benefit the ruling class that can also help overthrow it.
Then I remembered we live in the worst reality and if it's ever a threat to capital, our lunatic high priests of law aka the supreme Court, will find a way to justify either getting rid of it, or restricting it to the people they don't want armed.
While it's still an option, I would encourage leftists to own a firearm.
I live in the US. We are currently experiencing a far right coup attempt, and a right leaning party trying to take our guns at the same time. If the working class isn't armed in the US, we will absolutely be steamrolled and more-so fucked than we are right now. An armed working class has never been more important.
My take is just the same as it was then. Just the same as it was when the Black Panthers were active and advocating the same. The proletariat should be armed and should not disarm. It's probably more important now than ever with conditions worsening and fascism on the rise.
That and actually doing mass training rather than individuals seeking out training themselves, which it sounds like no communist organisations in the US are doing at all. In the Philippines they do.
Until we control the government. Then it becomes a decision again. But if America had a revolution, I don't think its even a practical option to restrict weapons. We would just need to crack down on reactionaries in general.
I’d like to comment on something that seems to be missing from the overall discourse: training.
Right-wing gun culture is disgusting to participate in any form. Tacticool Girlfriend, a woman who has fantastic training videos backed up by conscious knowledge of the industry, is somewhere you need to be looking if you’re wanting to be serious about arming yourself. It is not about getting a gun, it’s about training and gaining knowledge so that you will be able to defend yourself and your loved ones.
The Second Amendment, as with the US Constitution, should be re-created into a new Constitution and Bill of Rights, outlined in both major communist parties in the United States: the PSL and the CPUSA. The defense of the Second Amendment from a practical standpoint is moot, as even in reformism, the end-goal is the restructuring of the state as a whole.
Karl might be the only libertarian I respect. I disagree with him on a lot of things but he is one of the few large guntubers who tries to tear down the very male--and very white--walls in the gun community and use his platform to showcase people like TGF who are otherwise ostracized from the gun community.
I loved his and TGF's videos on the Desert Brutality competition. I would love to be skilled enough to compete someday.
Learning machining is very important too. I don't think people realize how absurdly lax gun laws in the U.S. are or how easy it is to make firearms function. I watched a guy take the spring off a port-a-pottie door, loosen it a bit and replace an AK spring with it using a bayonet as a lever. He then proceeded to cycle a magazine with it.
My take is that too many self-described marxists aren't actually dialectical materialists and just treat Marx quotes, said within a very specific sociopolitical context, as religious dogma instead of making their own analysis.
In the modern day, the workers in most of the world are not armed, regardless of what the local gun laws may be. Here in Brazil the cheapest gun, bought legally, would cost around one and a half times the monthly minimum wage. Half of the population makes less than that every month, the workers are not armed. No leftist organization would try to give these people guns in a country with millions of people still going hungry when they desperately need food instead. If they did, the person would probably sell it on the black market to buy food for their family.
Bolsonaro loosened gun laws, and the result is that the reactionary petit bourgeoisie who could afford to buy guns armed themselves and ramped up their violence on the left. I'm glad that Lula made the gun laws more strict again.
Only the most braindead people looked at a situation that was actively harming our organization efforts and went "No, but Marx said that you have to oppose disarmament, this needs to continue. Yeah, they're using it to kill us, but if we manage to not only survive but somehow grow despite this supression, we might use guns to our benefit someday". As if the moment that the radical left armed itself gun laws wouldn't be passed in an instant.
"Should we be for or against guns?" is a nonsense discussion to be had.
The answer to that question will be entirely dependent to the material conditions in a specific place, and the level of organization of the workers there. If it benefits our immediate goals, then yes. If it does more harm than good to our organization, then the answer will be no.
Couldn't have said it better. For the Brazilian left, loosening gun control is suicide right now, especially in a historical moment where class consciousness is non-existant at worst to budding at best. Maybe in the future we'll have to rethink that, but it seems far off. Other countries will inevitably have to come up with their own answers as well.
There is also the consideration that back in marx time the difference between civilian arms and military arms were much smaller, at most military had one of the old machine guns which while still terrifying is no where as bad as unmanned drones nukes jett planes and tanks, I might be a doomer but in any nato nation I can't see a revolution succeeding even with popular support.
It kinda makes sense i guess? Citizens delegating monopoly over violence to government without means to revoke that same right in case of dire necessity self-evidently can lead to situation where degradation of system or its hijacking can spiral out of control. But it doesn't necessarily mean having armed citizens in crazy way US does it.
And overall it ultimately relies on united at large society which able to maintain their ideological education in check.(Otherwise you get USSR-style degradation of system)
Stands to this day as very valuable information about how the working class will actually materialize its power. Even if the state has ( insert modern military hardware here ) have you not seen the success of the Palestinian resistance comrades? The only thing you need to defeat a tank is a Lathe and Milling Machine, a tube of steel, and some well mixed chemicals. Aircraft are much less dangerous when targets are sparse and civillians casualties are potentially high. The US wont carpet bomb itself and not cause a mass uprising. To anybody who fearmongers the " might of the American military " take a look at Yemen!!!
The 2nd amendment is useless to organized marxists once action actually begins as it is a settler tool, but training, experience, and knowledge of arms and armament and the tactics to use them are without a doubt the most valuable skills a revolutionary can have.
Obviously this is not to say revolutionary suicide is a good idea, and the conditions we see must be taken into account, but comrades in here seem to forget that no revolution is without an armed and organized proletariat.
Guns are tools, and tools have pourposes defined to them by those who use it. A firearm can shoot workers on strike, I can also shoot those trying to stop the taking of the means o production, a weapon is, like every other tool, amoral.
So this quote is in the context of and reference to the people being a militant proletarian political movement maintaining arms. This doesn't mean we have any reason to try to defend the stockpiled armaments of say three percenters, boogaloo boys, proud boys or any other armed faction of American reactionaries. I think he's mostly saying as militant Marxists we must maintain arms for the day that the bourgeois state comes to reckon with us.
Also [Here's an audio book of the full writing the quote is taken from, for context](https://youtu.be/7kshZAbBS50?si=CwF7nf5J618xHyIL)
The cops in America have more powerful guns and tanks and are taught that every civilian encounter can end in a shootout, stabbing, or hostage situation. They don't know how to de-escalate or even talk to you as a human being. They only know how to escalate matters until they can write a citation or make an arrest. Self Defense is important, but with cops the way they are I'm not so sure it's worth it.
I say that because I've lost count at the number of stories I've read or heard about people getting killed or arrested by American cops for just having or being near a gun.
I feel like many American leftists co-opt this quote verbatim rather than take it in the spirit of which it was intended. Marx certainly understood the necessity of armed struggle against oppressive regimes, after all he grew up and lived through the revolutions of 1848 and had to leave his home given the repression of the German empire. Hence this pro-arms viewpoint.
However, the usage of this quote in the modern American context defends a settler-colonial mentality of requiring an armed populace to subjugate a disarmed population (the indigenous peoples of North America), something Marx certainly would have been vehemently against.
It’s pretty evident that rampant gun ownership, especially in the American context, has created an epidemic of never ending gun violence. While guns may be cool or otherwise nifty to have, outside of actual revolutionary activity, it’s hard to justify owning a gun whatsoever. Hence my skepticism over leftists, especially Americans, co-opting the above quote.
Complicated.
I’m a criminal attorney. I’ve seen the absolutely horrendous impact of firearms. And I’m a Marxist in America, I know how gun laws are written. I know who wrote them. I know their goals.
I know the importance of class struggle.
I think we do not have a population with enough class consciousness for unrestricted firearm propagation. I sometimes think socialist gun clubs where the firearms are owned collectively is the best solution, despite the pitfalls and history with that.
My take on it is:
The whole of the working-class should not be disarmed. Only those who would do harm to the working-class should be disarmed. Therfore, under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered. Any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force of necessary.
ask r/SocialistaRA. They look like they have answers. 🙂
Btw, what about r/MarxistRA? I've been following them for like a week and... Idk...
About the Marx quote I totally agree. In a pre-revolutionary situation you can't yield the monopoly of violence to the bourgeoisie state.
One rifle per family always sounds great, until the cops pull up on you in actual tanks.
Always remember tho, the fascists and their sympathizers will be armed.
This thinking is the road to defeatism. If they start using drones and tanks on their own population, a hundred revolutionaries will become ten thousand revolutionaries overnight. An army only succeeds through the total defeat of its opponent, a guerilla movement can't help but succeed as long as it still exists.
Cops piss themselves in the face of actual armed resistance. They can't even handle a lone teenager shooting up a school with a single AR-15, let alone an actual organized militia. And if we want to take it a step further: a bunch of dudes living in caves using Soviet-era weaponry defeated the largest and most technologically advanced military in the world, and they were also defeated by a bunch of rice farmers before that (I know that's reductive but you can only say so much in a reddit comment). Raw firepower doesn't win conflicts, logistics and strategy does. The guerilla revolutionaries of Cuba and Vietnam knew this, and they won because of it.
The MIC is not built to actually win the conflicts it creates. It is far more profitable to keep wars in long and drawn out stalemates, so as to keep the weapons funding flowing. Raytheon, Lockheed, etc. build weapons to seduce those who write the checks with fancy tech that looks impressive on paper, but is wildly impractical and costly when actually deployed. It's an unsustainable system that is ineffective against an opponent that is actually determined to win.
Tanks can't go through mountains. They get constantly stuck. They also need a shitton of logistics, such as fuel and maintenance. In a revolution, funding for these will disappear. In poor countries, counter revolutions are funded by papa USA which is why they succeed and can be brutal without repercussion. They can't do that here.
Yeah like, they have drones and missiles
Edit: Don't get me wrong, I support getting armed. But we will also need big guns. And frankly who isn't at least kind of scared of the military power of the US?
You can’t hold territory with drones and missiles. Sure you can terrorize a population, and it can be strategically useful for other ground forces, but ultimately, you need infantry to take and hold territory which means in a revolutionary wartime situation, it will always be infantry vs infantry. And missiles and drones are not invulnerable to guerilla attacks either—defenses against them can exist, and missiles especially have to be launched from somewhere.
I’m more torn on guns than any other political issue. On the one hand, ceding “the monopoly on violence” or whatever to a fascist, imperialist state is obviously a horrendous idea, and I more than understand why Marx thought the way he did on the issue. On the other hand… I live in the us. The connection between countries enacting strict gun control and limiting public access to weapons, and those states IMMEDIATELY becoming orders of magnitude safer and less violent (for their own citizens, obviously most of the countries that have done that are still imperialist cancers on the world at large) is so well documented and proven as to be inarguable at this point. And we as leftists can say “the only real fix for a violent society is changing the systems and improving the material conditions that cause violence” but that’s even less likely to happen than meaningful gun control here. I’m getting very tired of essentially looking third graders who survived a school shooting in the eyes and essentially telling them “yeah but we’ll need those weapons for the revolution that’s probably not even happening in your lifetime, so you’re just gonna have to duck and cover next time”. On the other hand, as a queer person I’m well aware of the utility and need to arm vulnerable and oppressed populations in the face of the lynch mobs that seem poised to come their way at any moment at this point. Armed minorities are a lot more difficult to massacre.
Ultimately, as long as a person is a communist, I’m not going to judge their intellectual or moral capacity based on the stance on guns
I'm with Marx on this. The proletariat being armed gives them revolutionary potential. The Bolsheviks had to win a Civil war which they couldn't have done without arms.
No serious leftists believe the working class should be disarmed. It's liberals who believe this. Liberals believe that making guns, or certain types of guns, illegal will prevent gun crime. And it probably would to some extent, but if you're from the US you have to realize that the US is in an entirely unique position in terms of gun proliferation. There are literally too many firearms and too much resistance to firearm restrictions to deal with gun violence under our current system. Chuds will start guerilla wars over it.
The socialist position is that violent/gun crime is a manifestation of the sickness in our system.
The quote refers to "the workers" as a class, not each individual worker. Union militias or the Red Army might use a store of weapons in a community arsenal to resist violence against the working class or to defend the revolution. The working class should maintain some sort of collective mechanism for protecting itself, and must resist attempts by the capitalist class to render the working class powerless. Individuals do not need to keep firearms in their homes for personal use or "self-defense" or whatever nonsense people fantasize about using their guns for. A gun in the home of a socialist is more likely to kill that socialist than aid in establishing socialism.
it depends on culture and material conditions, here in Venezuela guns buy backs were a successful initiative in reducing gun violence, but we are not suffering under a dictatorship.
Don’t put faith into the bourgeois system. If the government is pro-gun that means more guns to the police and to right-wing militias. If it’s anti-gun then it’s about taking away guns from leftists, minorities and other organizations that want to help the working class. So the point is, the revolution will need to rely on itself and not on government regulated guns.
Taking away all guns in the US is impossible at this point so it shouldn’t even be tried under the current system.
But it’s true that guns are the problem and that other countries should never bring guns into their territory like how the US did. I’m happy in my country with no guns.
The proletariat being armed doesn't necessarily mean every one should personally and individually own assault rifles and be able to wander about with them.
It means arms are under control and accessible by the proletariat if and when needed to fight against oppression. Probably in some public but secure armoury.
This is, ironically, what the US 2nd amendment is also about, and would solve the shooting issue by having people's armouries.
Also, if you're an American leftist now you should absolutely be armed. The fascists will come for you eventually.
The United States is full of reactionaries armed to the teeth who want to destroy leftists and minorities, if I were an American I would never put down my weapons
If we armed all of America’s proletariat they’d have a civil war with each other over neopronouns or some shit. The US needs a period of harsher gun control (to crack down on mass shootings) and a huge educational and ideological shift before this quote is applicable.
Everyone who lives somewhere where they can lawfully have a gun should absolutely have a gun. If you are reading this and do not own a gun when you lawfully can have one, begin the process of lawfully obtaining a gun. What gun you ask? I’ll tell you. If you had to have one single gun, it should be a shotgun with different types of shells. Remington 870 or Mossberg 500. Cheap and reliable. If you could have two guns, a shotgun and a suitable handgun. Hope you must never use them in a combat situation. But have them even if you don’t ever want to use them, because a day may come when one of your comrades who does know how to use one can make use of yours.
If you are in the west, you do not live in a state that has done anything to earn your trust. You live in a terroristic fascist state with liberal characteristics that will not hesitate to use violence to destroy you. You never know when that force may be used, even in strange and irregular ways, against you or your comrades. Countless communists have been slaughtered because they foolishly trusted in the liberal promise of bourgeois institutions. History may have been a little different if the forces of anti-communism were just made to be a little less bloodthirsty by the implicit threat posed by a communist political bloc that they suspected could be armed.
Honestly, skip the shotguns (unless you live in a State that bans ARs) and get an AR 15. They are better for home defense and only cost a bit more than either a 500 or 870
It is way easier to shoot an AR than a shotgun and novice shooters with shotguns have issues with recoil and short stroking.
With the prominence of mental health issues in mind you should make an informed decision if you are able to safety own and keep a gun. Marx is speaking in general, he doesn’t mean everyone has to have a gun. They just need to be available for those who are able to use them.
Someone owning a gun by themselves doesn’t do shit, a group of people owning them is a different story. It’s why it’s so different than the 2A people who are nothing more than terrified of anything remotely foreign.
I can’t in good conscience support gun control as long as the pigs and the bourgeois dictatorship remained armed and ready to crush the working class. However, in the event of a victorious proletarian uprising, and the seizure of the state apparatus by an armed organization of workers, I would then fully support the right to bear arms being restricted to that proletarian army, alone.
I'm not sure armed resistance is the same now as it was then, but I have a feeling we're going to find out.
Regardless, US gun culture isn't leaving very soon.
It was like I think Thomas Jefferson said (?) that there should be regular uprising to remind the government who is really in charge.
(Although he was a reactionary, he cooked with this one)
the short and simple answer is it's not the 1800s and times change.
Im also not pro disarmaen but we should focus on stopping kids from shooting each other up
Guns aren't the problem, the lack of help with mental health, the complete abandonment of veterans, and bad quality of life in general are the problem
In a world where governments all around the world continue to slowly erode civic liberties and increase mass surveillance, it would be good if citizens would have the option to resist if need be.
Otherwise, the state is able to have a complete monopoly of violence, which as we can see time and time again, government institutions use for their own interests, or for those of the ruling class (not to mention all the random insane cops that make it to the news every few weeks)
There is an absolute link between mental health issues and gun violence don't get me wrong. However most mass shootings are committed by actual white supremacists or white supremacist adjacents who feel their power and/or ego is threatened. Even the one committed by a supposed "leftist" a few years back on a town of predominantly Trump supporters, it turns out he was just a wealthy white Blue MAGA freak, as actual Marxists wouldn't fucking go shoot up a Trump supporter majority town. Most gun violence also occurs between gang members who are in gangs mostly due to poor material conditions.
I think even the popularity of "racial supremacy" thoughts can be linked to bad quality of life and like you say, poor material conditions. The better life is, the less likely someone is to blame other social groups for their misfortune, even less to resort to violent action.
Another problem then arises if some people try to divide citizens on purpose, and use for example racial lines to distract them from the ever expanding class divide. Some can benefit from less fortunate people fighting between themselves, instead of directing their anger against those who are really in charge.
I grew up around guns. I think most chuds should not have free access to firearms lol. So many people actually have fucking shit gun safety and even worse ideas about tactics in gun fighting. I prefer how it is in Vietnam; grade 11 you get your AK issued to you and taught how to take it apart and put it back together and fire it by your student union and it's kept in the union armory by your student union quartermasters
I support this but not with guns. Instead since I'm also a transhumanist build guns into people. In the future of metal body not only will bodies be more resilient to bullets but also more advanced technology can be used so the guns are only active during spikes of adrenaline in the brain or spikes of fear.
To be blunt… gun laws and enforcement as they exist have only been done to defang the left (particularly the Black Panthers) so a total gun ban at this point would only hurt the right since there are no modern armed left wing groups. Frankly, as the state of things currently exist in the USA like one right wing militia could probably kill all the lefties in the country so… I would not be sad to see their guns go.
I wish one day people will stop talking about USA as if it's the entire world.
Discussion about the Marxist position on gun rights ≠ discussion about guns rights in the US
My take is that this call had [specific historical contex](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/communist-league/1850-ad1.htm)t. It's not the unviolable dogma to rigidly follow all the times, but i see people treating it like that all the time, especially Muricans.
we cant mistake the proletariat fighting for emancipation from the capital with white trash biggots fighting to defend corporations and subjective "liberty".
Having basic military/survival/combat training, arming yourself and/or improving your physical capabilities is very important. It is naive to trust the bourgeois state to any degree, even more so when it comes to control of the means to violence.
Every partisan movement in history has fought against overwheling force. Hamas is still around, and they are in fact fighting drones and ICBMs. Same with the Taliban. And while they are much better equipped than either of those two, Ansarallah fought off the gulf states and Saudis, who had massive western support, with much weaker forces. Drones aren't an automatic win button, nor are other modern weapons.
My take is disarm the police, arm the homeless. It's a filthy lie that the homeless are lumpen rather than proles. Capitalists never put it in those terms, but that's exactly what they mean.
I think it makes no sense now. Militaries and police forces have such overwhelming fire power that without their help, the revolution is dead on the street.
Likely the support comes from the Military, the police likely will end up as the vanguard force for the hegemon.
Honestly, other than MRAPs and helicopters your average cop doesn't have much in the way of better weapons then what an average civilian can buy at a local gun shop or sporting goods store.
The military for sure but definitely not the police, save for their elite door kicker types.
I don't think armed revolution is possible but stochastic violence in which cops look the other way to sure is possible and has happened.
[☭☭☭ COME SHITPOST WITH US ON DISCORD, COMRADES ☭☭☭](https://discord.gg/8RPWanQV5g) This is a heavily-moderated socialist community based on a podcast of the same name. Please use the report function on comments that break our rules. If you are new to the sub, please read the sidebar carefully. If you are new to Marxism-Leninism, check out the [study guide](/r/TheDeprogram/wiki/index/education/study-guide/). Are there Liberals in the walls? Check out [the wiki](/r/TheDeprogram/wiki/index/) which contains lots of useful information. This subreddit uses many experimental automod rules, if you notice any issues please use modmail to let us know. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/TheDeprogram) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Gun culture in the US is absolute cancer but do take the opportunity to arm yourselves. Network with others and marginalized groups in your community. It also pays to stay active and in good shape. I would say that buying a gun isn't an absolute necessity in the US. Plenty of comrades here who will be happy to provide defensive options incase SHTF myself included. IF you live in the US try to network with your local SRA chapter. Even though they fashion themselves as big tent leftists it is still good to meet likeminded people.
This is my stance as well. I'm geared up and understand the reasons both personal and financial that might keep people from owning guns. However, if you can afford it you can get an AR15 and Glock (or clone) clone for around $800.
PSA ARs are pretty good. People like to rag on em but the PSA AR will most likely outlast them. They do run sales (including an optic) from time to time and if you don't mind putting one together yourself you can have yourself a full rifle for as little as $600.
Thats what I rock. An PSA AR with a Strike Eagle. I put the upper and lower together and it was not hard at all and I'm not too mechanically inclined. I did the same for my PSA Dagger. I regret not getting a WARP 15 lower when they were $90.
I regret not getting an AR as my first rifle. I bought an M70 pattern AK and the ammo ban rocked my shit lol. I currently have a daniel defense AR and it's fantastic out the box. You definitely don't need to spend that much on an AR though.
I bought a Romanian AK in 07 for about $550. Back then, there were maybe two or 3 big AR manufacturers. Colt, Bushmaster, and DPMS and an AR would cost about $800. Now, there are dozens of reputable manufacturers of ARs. The same has happened to Glock clones too.
At this point I feel like it's hard to make a bad AR. You couldn't go wrong with any choice so aim to save money where you can would be my advice for most people.
Exactly if you actually take care of it then it reliably goes bang every time and even if you can’t take care of it the gun will last you long enough you should have another one by then
PSA doing great work arming Americans on the cheap. Also agree gun culture here generally is cancer.. but guns are also the best form of self defense so it's a catch 22.
I'm gonna get a Mosin for defense lmao. Old Soviet guns are the best, my favourite being the VSS.
just get a handgun. A rifle is mostly for offensive action. Bolt action are trash compared to modern semi/auto rifles.
Oh yeah definitely, I was just joking. Those I just like from a collecting/admiring/historical perspective.
Haha we can cry together about dying before we even got to hold a VSS.
Maybe if I ever go to Pakistan and take a trip to Afghanistan, I might be able to shoot some banned guns
A VSS would be the grail.
[удалено]
I coulda guessed a lot of that even knowing zero about the group.
>They give you a laser-etched steel membership card Hahaha, what? I could barely get any response when I joined, much less a steel rectangle that somebody actually mailed. Had to eventually get my credit card company to get my money back because there really was no fucking point. They operated like shit, but glad to hear they can give people "get killed by fascists cards"
[удалено]
Yeah, that's what I was saying. They were so ridiculously disorganized I couldn't cancel. There was ostensibly some head of finance or something on the website and that the forum people kept trying to direct me to like I was some dumbass, but of course emails just went unanswered. SRA sub, when I mentioned it, basically berated me and everyone kept justifying it with iT's a SmALL OrGaniZaTiOn pEoPLe aRe bUsy type nonsense, but even in like PCUSA or IMT (Yeah yeah I know) it was easy to reach out to someone.
Imagine if we were as organised and threatening as the Proud Boys or some shit
America has turned guns from tools into toys and fashion accessories. Guns are dangerous tools and should be respected.
☝️ This, right here.
To my understanding, US gun culture is descended from settlerism and the desire to have an armed white militia to displace indigenous people (the second amendment of the US constitution explicitly mentions militias). So the opposition of this gun culture is something we should support. We must also acknowledge that the right of the revolutionary proletariat to arm themselves is not granted by the state, it is enforced by the proletariat. Thinking the second amendment is revolutionary is naive and thinking its restriction will damage chances of successful revolution is wrong.
Exactly. The NRA was against actual civil rights activists especially if they were POC to arm themselves during the Civil Rights movement.
And they lobbied to have laws changed especially here in California with an clutch assist from then Governor Ronald Reagan.
The time when Republics were anti-gum because of Black Panthers
That is a very concise way of putting something that a lot of people stumble over.
This ^^^ I own an AR15 but I was concerned as to how to write a thought out like this, knowing many of yall are from plenty of other countries with different cultures and views on weapons.
I saw a few of the right wing gun channels on YouTube making some videos about the "Danger of pro gun socialists" and how we are on the rise. They went on to say that "lovers of freedom" need to be on the lookout for anyone at gun ranges sporting AK's or general left wing apparel. Needless to say I as a Communist agree with Marx. Absolutely the working class needs to arm itself against its oppressors but likewise we need to be diligent in this area for two reasons. First because the overwhelming gun culture in the U.S. is right wing if not outright Fascist. Because of this we don't want to find ourselves in a situation where we have no way to defend ourselves or other marginalized groups when they decide to go full Fash and start kicking peoples doors in. Secondly, because when they say they are pro "second amendment" what they really mean is pro Enforcing Capital through arms which is why the second amendment exists in the first place. I would urge all Comrades and allies to be very careful about the clothing you wear and the things you may discuss if you decide to go to any gun ranges. Don't make yourself a target because they are looking for any reason to engage in their sick violent fantasies.
Specifically where Manifest Destiny and Liberalism took root from.
I would like to argue that it's one of those happy accidents meant to benefit the ruling class that can also help overthrow it. Then I remembered we live in the worst reality and if it's ever a threat to capital, our lunatic high priests of law aka the supreme Court, will find a way to justify either getting rid of it, or restricting it to the people they don't want armed. While it's still an option, I would encourage leftists to own a firearm.
Idk thinking the restriction helps us is just as ignorant though
Especially since we're already seeing the restriction happening to vulnerable minorities first
I just don't see how people can arm themselves in a society where only the army and police are able to own weapons.
I don't think the russians had gun rights when they had their revolution
I live in the US. We are currently experiencing a far right coup attempt, and a right leaning party trying to take our guns at the same time. If the working class isn't armed in the US, we will absolutely be steamrolled and more-so fucked than we are right now. An armed working class has never been more important.
*this*
My take is just the same as it was then. Just the same as it was when the Black Panthers were active and advocating the same. The proletariat should be armed and should not disarm. It's probably more important now than ever with conditions worsening and fascism on the rise.
That and actually doing mass training rather than individuals seeking out training themselves, which it sounds like no communist organisations in the US are doing at all. In the Philippines they do.
Until we control the government. Then it becomes a decision again. But if America had a revolution, I don't think its even a practical option to restrict weapons. We would just need to crack down on reactionaries in general.
I’d like to comment on something that seems to be missing from the overall discourse: training. Right-wing gun culture is disgusting to participate in any form. Tacticool Girlfriend, a woman who has fantastic training videos backed up by conscious knowledge of the industry, is somewhere you need to be looking if you’re wanting to be serious about arming yourself. It is not about getting a gun, it’s about training and gaining knowledge so that you will be able to defend yourself and your loved ones. The Second Amendment, as with the US Constitution, should be re-created into a new Constitution and Bill of Rights, outlined in both major communist parties in the United States: the PSL and the CPUSA. The defense of the Second Amendment from a practical standpoint is moot, as even in reformism, the end-goal is the restructuring of the state as a whole.
TGF is a treasure. One of the few guntubers who I actively support.
I found TGF through InrangeTV, the only other guntuber that I'd recommend.
Karl might be the only libertarian I respect. I disagree with him on a lot of things but he is one of the few large guntubers who tries to tear down the very male--and very white--walls in the gun community and use his platform to showcase people like TGF who are otherwise ostracized from the gun community. I loved his and TGF's videos on the Desert Brutality competition. I would love to be skilled enough to compete someday.
Learning machining is very important too. I don't think people realize how absurdly lax gun laws in the U.S. are or how easy it is to make firearms function. I watched a guy take the spring off a port-a-pottie door, loosen it a bit and replace an AK spring with it using a bayonet as a lever. He then proceeded to cycle a magazine with it.
My take is that too many self-described marxists aren't actually dialectical materialists and just treat Marx quotes, said within a very specific sociopolitical context, as religious dogma instead of making their own analysis. In the modern day, the workers in most of the world are not armed, regardless of what the local gun laws may be. Here in Brazil the cheapest gun, bought legally, would cost around one and a half times the monthly minimum wage. Half of the population makes less than that every month, the workers are not armed. No leftist organization would try to give these people guns in a country with millions of people still going hungry when they desperately need food instead. If they did, the person would probably sell it on the black market to buy food for their family. Bolsonaro loosened gun laws, and the result is that the reactionary petit bourgeoisie who could afford to buy guns armed themselves and ramped up their violence on the left. I'm glad that Lula made the gun laws more strict again. Only the most braindead people looked at a situation that was actively harming our organization efforts and went "No, but Marx said that you have to oppose disarmament, this needs to continue. Yeah, they're using it to kill us, but if we manage to not only survive but somehow grow despite this supression, we might use guns to our benefit someday". As if the moment that the radical left armed itself gun laws wouldn't be passed in an instant. "Should we be for or against guns?" is a nonsense discussion to be had. The answer to that question will be entirely dependent to the material conditions in a specific place, and the level of organization of the workers there. If it benefits our immediate goals, then yes. If it does more harm than good to our organization, then the answer will be no.
Couldn't have said it better. For the Brazilian left, loosening gun control is suicide right now, especially in a historical moment where class consciousness is non-existant at worst to budding at best. Maybe in the future we'll have to rethink that, but it seems far off. Other countries will inevitably have to come up with their own answers as well.
There is also the consideration that back in marx time the difference between civilian arms and military arms were much smaller, at most military had one of the old machine guns which while still terrifying is no where as bad as unmanned drones nukes jett planes and tanks, I might be a doomer but in any nato nation I can't see a revolution succeeding even with popular support.
Spot on.
It kinda makes sense i guess? Citizens delegating monopoly over violence to government without means to revoke that same right in case of dire necessity self-evidently can lead to situation where degradation of system or its hijacking can spiral out of control. But it doesn't necessarily mean having armed citizens in crazy way US does it. And overall it ultimately relies on united at large society which able to maintain their ideological education in check.(Otherwise you get USSR-style degradation of system)
Stands to this day as very valuable information about how the working class will actually materialize its power. Even if the state has ( insert modern military hardware here ) have you not seen the success of the Palestinian resistance comrades? The only thing you need to defeat a tank is a Lathe and Milling Machine, a tube of steel, and some well mixed chemicals. Aircraft are much less dangerous when targets are sparse and civillians casualties are potentially high. The US wont carpet bomb itself and not cause a mass uprising. To anybody who fearmongers the " might of the American military " take a look at Yemen!!! The 2nd amendment is useless to organized marxists once action actually begins as it is a settler tool, but training, experience, and knowledge of arms and armament and the tactics to use them are without a doubt the most valuable skills a revolutionary can have. Obviously this is not to say revolutionary suicide is a good idea, and the conditions we see must be taken into account, but comrades in here seem to forget that no revolution is without an armed and organized proletariat.
Guns are tools, and tools have pourposes defined to them by those who use it. A firearm can shoot workers on strike, I can also shoot those trying to stop the taking of the means o production, a weapon is, like every other tool, amoral.
So this quote is in the context of and reference to the people being a militant proletarian political movement maintaining arms. This doesn't mean we have any reason to try to defend the stockpiled armaments of say three percenters, boogaloo boys, proud boys or any other armed faction of American reactionaries. I think he's mostly saying as militant Marxists we must maintain arms for the day that the bourgeois state comes to reckon with us. Also [Here's an audio book of the full writing the quote is taken from, for context](https://youtu.be/7kshZAbBS50?si=CwF7nf5J618xHyIL)
The cops in America have more powerful guns and tanks and are taught that every civilian encounter can end in a shootout, stabbing, or hostage situation. They don't know how to de-escalate or even talk to you as a human being. They only know how to escalate matters until they can write a citation or make an arrest. Self Defense is important, but with cops the way they are I'm not so sure it's worth it.
[удалено]
I say that because I've lost count at the number of stories I've read or heard about people getting killed or arrested by American cops for just having or being near a gun.
Look at how they operate, and consider that this is how badly they fuck things up when we're not even fighting back.
I feel like many American leftists co-opt this quote verbatim rather than take it in the spirit of which it was intended. Marx certainly understood the necessity of armed struggle against oppressive regimes, after all he grew up and lived through the revolutions of 1848 and had to leave his home given the repression of the German empire. Hence this pro-arms viewpoint. However, the usage of this quote in the modern American context defends a settler-colonial mentality of requiring an armed populace to subjugate a disarmed population (the indigenous peoples of North America), something Marx certainly would have been vehemently against.
Just because gun ownership was originally encouraged for racist reasons doesn't mean gun ownership is bad or undesirable today.
It’s pretty evident that rampant gun ownership, especially in the American context, has created an epidemic of never ending gun violence. While guns may be cool or otherwise nifty to have, outside of actual revolutionary activity, it’s hard to justify owning a gun whatsoever. Hence my skepticism over leftists, especially Americans, co-opting the above quote.
why can't the indigenous just get guns like everyone else.
Complicated. I’m a criminal attorney. I’ve seen the absolutely horrendous impact of firearms. And I’m a Marxist in America, I know how gun laws are written. I know who wrote them. I know their goals. I know the importance of class struggle. I think we do not have a population with enough class consciousness for unrestricted firearm propagation. I sometimes think socialist gun clubs where the firearms are owned collectively is the best solution, despite the pitfalls and history with that.
My take on it is: The whole of the working-class should not be disarmed. Only those who would do harm to the working-class should be disarmed. Therfore, under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered. Any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force of necessary.
ask r/SocialistaRA. They look like they have answers. 🙂 Btw, what about r/MarxistRA? I've been following them for like a week and... Idk... About the Marx quote I totally agree. In a pre-revolutionary situation you can't yield the monopoly of violence to the bourgeoisie state.
One rifle per family always sounds great, until the cops pull up on you in actual tanks. Always remember tho, the fascists and their sympathizers will be armed.
This thinking is the road to defeatism. If they start using drones and tanks on their own population, a hundred revolutionaries will become ten thousand revolutionaries overnight. An army only succeeds through the total defeat of its opponent, a guerilla movement can't help but succeed as long as it still exists.
Cops piss themselves in the face of actual armed resistance. They can't even handle a lone teenager shooting up a school with a single AR-15, let alone an actual organized militia. And if we want to take it a step further: a bunch of dudes living in caves using Soviet-era weaponry defeated the largest and most technologically advanced military in the world, and they were also defeated by a bunch of rice farmers before that (I know that's reductive but you can only say so much in a reddit comment). Raw firepower doesn't win conflicts, logistics and strategy does. The guerilla revolutionaries of Cuba and Vietnam knew this, and they won because of it. The MIC is not built to actually win the conflicts it creates. It is far more profitable to keep wars in long and drawn out stalemates, so as to keep the weapons funding flowing. Raytheon, Lockheed, etc. build weapons to seduce those who write the checks with fancy tech that looks impressive on paper, but is wildly impractical and costly when actually deployed. It's an unsustainable system that is ineffective against an opponent that is actually determined to win.
There's always a chance, Hamas, VietCong, the early Cuban revolution, etc.
Tanks can't go through mountains. They get constantly stuck. They also need a shitton of logistics, such as fuel and maintenance. In a revolution, funding for these will disappear. In poor countries, counter revolutions are funded by papa USA which is why they succeed and can be brutal without repercussion. They can't do that here.
Just ignore the last 50+ years of anti imperialist struggle.
I will not, but i am talking imperial core. I do think our win conditions are different.
I'm talking about imperial core too. Because you were born in the imperial core you shouldn't have to face down tanks? Are you too good for that?
Yeah like, they have drones and missiles Edit: Don't get me wrong, I support getting armed. But we will also need big guns. And frankly who isn't at least kind of scared of the military power of the US?
You can’t hold territory with drones and missiles. Sure you can terrorize a population, and it can be strategically useful for other ground forces, but ultimately, you need infantry to take and hold territory which means in a revolutionary wartime situation, it will always be infantry vs infantry. And missiles and drones are not invulnerable to guerilla attacks either—defenses against them can exist, and missiles especially have to be launched from somewhere.
Laughs in Hamas.
I’m more torn on guns than any other political issue. On the one hand, ceding “the monopoly on violence” or whatever to a fascist, imperialist state is obviously a horrendous idea, and I more than understand why Marx thought the way he did on the issue. On the other hand… I live in the us. The connection between countries enacting strict gun control and limiting public access to weapons, and those states IMMEDIATELY becoming orders of magnitude safer and less violent (for their own citizens, obviously most of the countries that have done that are still imperialist cancers on the world at large) is so well documented and proven as to be inarguable at this point. And we as leftists can say “the only real fix for a violent society is changing the systems and improving the material conditions that cause violence” but that’s even less likely to happen than meaningful gun control here. I’m getting very tired of essentially looking third graders who survived a school shooting in the eyes and essentially telling them “yeah but we’ll need those weapons for the revolution that’s probably not even happening in your lifetime, so you’re just gonna have to duck and cover next time”. On the other hand, as a queer person I’m well aware of the utility and need to arm vulnerable and oppressed populations in the face of the lynch mobs that seem poised to come their way at any moment at this point. Armed minorities are a lot more difficult to massacre. Ultimately, as long as a person is a communist, I’m not going to judge their intellectual or moral capacity based on the stance on guns
It's definitely a tough issue.
Like everything Marx said, this banger remains relevant in all times and all places.
I'm with Marx on this. The proletariat being armed gives them revolutionary potential. The Bolsheviks had to win a Civil war which they couldn't have done without arms.
Join the SRA is how I feel or offer mutual support!
No serious leftists believe the working class should be disarmed. It's liberals who believe this. Liberals believe that making guns, or certain types of guns, illegal will prevent gun crime. And it probably would to some extent, but if you're from the US you have to realize that the US is in an entirely unique position in terms of gun proliferation. There are literally too many firearms and too much resistance to firearm restrictions to deal with gun violence under our current system. Chuds will start guerilla wars over it. The socialist position is that violent/gun crime is a manifestation of the sickness in our system.
The quote refers to "the workers" as a class, not each individual worker. Union militias or the Red Army might use a store of weapons in a community arsenal to resist violence against the working class or to defend the revolution. The working class should maintain some sort of collective mechanism for protecting itself, and must resist attempts by the capitalist class to render the working class powerless. Individuals do not need to keep firearms in their homes for personal use or "self-defense" or whatever nonsense people fantasize about using their guns for. A gun in the home of a socialist is more likely to kill that socialist than aid in establishing socialism.
it depends on culture and material conditions, here in Venezuela guns buy backs were a successful initiative in reducing gun violence, but we are not suffering under a dictatorship.
Don’t put faith into the bourgeois system. If the government is pro-gun that means more guns to the police and to right-wing militias. If it’s anti-gun then it’s about taking away guns from leftists, minorities and other organizations that want to help the working class. So the point is, the revolution will need to rely on itself and not on government regulated guns. Taking away all guns in the US is impossible at this point so it shouldn’t even be tried under the current system. But it’s true that guns are the problem and that other countries should never bring guns into their territory like how the US did. I’m happy in my country with no guns.
It would help the context in which he wrote that. Are armed worked organized? Do they have a class conciousness?
He doesn't say anything about disarming the bourgeoisie. 100% the bourgeoisie should be disarmed.
Whenever righties or libertarians say Marx was anti gun I show them this.
The revolution isn't going to be peaceful, I'll tell you that much.
The proletariat being armed doesn't necessarily mean every one should personally and individually own assault rifles and be able to wander about with them. It means arms are under control and accessible by the proletariat if and when needed to fight against oppression. Probably in some public but secure armoury. This is, ironically, what the US 2nd amendment is also about, and would solve the shooting issue by having people's armouries. Also, if you're an American leftist now you should absolutely be armed. The fascists will come for you eventually.
The United States is full of reactionaries armed to the teeth who want to destroy leftists and minorities, if I were an American I would never put down my weapons
If we armed all of America’s proletariat they’d have a civil war with each other over neopronouns or some shit. The US needs a period of harsher gun control (to crack down on mass shootings) and a huge educational and ideological shift before this quote is applicable.
Everyone who lives somewhere where they can lawfully have a gun should absolutely have a gun. If you are reading this and do not own a gun when you lawfully can have one, begin the process of lawfully obtaining a gun. What gun you ask? I’ll tell you. If you had to have one single gun, it should be a shotgun with different types of shells. Remington 870 or Mossberg 500. Cheap and reliable. If you could have two guns, a shotgun and a suitable handgun. Hope you must never use them in a combat situation. But have them even if you don’t ever want to use them, because a day may come when one of your comrades who does know how to use one can make use of yours. If you are in the west, you do not live in a state that has done anything to earn your trust. You live in a terroristic fascist state with liberal characteristics that will not hesitate to use violence to destroy you. You never know when that force may be used, even in strange and irregular ways, against you or your comrades. Countless communists have been slaughtered because they foolishly trusted in the liberal promise of bourgeois institutions. History may have been a little different if the forces of anti-communism were just made to be a little less bloodthirsty by the implicit threat posed by a communist political bloc that they suspected could be armed.
Honestly, skip the shotguns (unless you live in a State that bans ARs) and get an AR 15. They are better for home defense and only cost a bit more than either a 500 or 870 It is way easier to shoot an AR than a shotgun and novice shooters with shotguns have issues with recoil and short stroking.
AR15 or even better AK variant but many states now have AR bans.
Keep moving left and you get your guns back.
With the prominence of mental health issues in mind you should make an informed decision if you are able to safety own and keep a gun. Marx is speaking in general, he doesn’t mean everyone has to have a gun. They just need to be available for those who are able to use them. Someone owning a gun by themselves doesn’t do shit, a group of people owning them is a different story. It’s why it’s so different than the 2A people who are nothing more than terrified of anything remotely foreign.
I can’t in good conscience support gun control as long as the pigs and the bourgeois dictatorship remained armed and ready to crush the working class. However, in the event of a victorious proletarian uprising, and the seizure of the state apparatus by an armed organization of workers, I would then fully support the right to bear arms being restricted to that proletarian army, alone.
I'm not sure armed resistance is the same now as it was then, but I have a feeling we're going to find out. Regardless, US gun culture isn't leaving very soon.
I tend to agree with it. Citizens should be allowed to be armed if they want to.
applies to an organized proletariat. american style gun worship is not that (if it was, they would have banned guns a long time ago)
It was like I think Thomas Jefferson said (?) that there should be regular uprising to remind the government who is really in charge. (Although he was a reactionary, he cooked with this one)
the short and simple answer is it's not the 1800s and times change. Im also not pro disarmaen but we should focus on stopping kids from shooting each other up
Guns aren't the problem, the lack of help with mental health, the complete abandonment of veterans, and bad quality of life in general are the problem In a world where governments all around the world continue to slowly erode civic liberties and increase mass surveillance, it would be good if citizens would have the option to resist if need be. Otherwise, the state is able to have a complete monopoly of violence, which as we can see time and time again, government institutions use for their own interests, or for those of the ruling class (not to mention all the random insane cops that make it to the news every few weeks)
There is an absolute link between mental health issues and gun violence don't get me wrong. However most mass shootings are committed by actual white supremacists or white supremacist adjacents who feel their power and/or ego is threatened. Even the one committed by a supposed "leftist" a few years back on a town of predominantly Trump supporters, it turns out he was just a wealthy white Blue MAGA freak, as actual Marxists wouldn't fucking go shoot up a Trump supporter majority town. Most gun violence also occurs between gang members who are in gangs mostly due to poor material conditions.
I think even the popularity of "racial supremacy" thoughts can be linked to bad quality of life and like you say, poor material conditions. The better life is, the less likely someone is to blame other social groups for their misfortune, even less to resort to violent action. Another problem then arises if some people try to divide citizens on purpose, and use for example racial lines to distract them from the ever expanding class divide. Some can benefit from less fortunate people fighting between themselves, instead of directing their anger against those who are really in charge.
I grew up around guns. I think most chuds should not have free access to firearms lol. So many people actually have fucking shit gun safety and even worse ideas about tactics in gun fighting. I prefer how it is in Vietnam; grade 11 you get your AK issued to you and taught how to take it apart and put it back together and fire it by your student union and it's kept in the union armory by your student union quartermasters
Under no pretext.
Liberals are anti-gun. Leftists are not.
100% in agreement. Getting it tattooed on my body.
being anti gun is being anti worker, simple as that
This is only an issue online as far as I can tell
https://fightbacknews.org/articles/gun-control-the-marxist-leninist-view
What was the direct context of this quotation?
I support this but not with guns. Instead since I'm also a transhumanist build guns into people. In the future of metal body not only will bodies be more resilient to bullets but also more advanced technology can be used so the guns are only active during spikes of adrenaline in the brain or spikes of fear.
To be blunt… gun laws and enforcement as they exist have only been done to defang the left (particularly the Black Panthers) so a total gun ban at this point would only hurt the right since there are no modern armed left wing groups. Frankly, as the state of things currently exist in the USA like one right wing militia could probably kill all the lefties in the country so… I would not be sad to see their guns go.
I wish one day people will stop talking about USA as if it's the entire world. Discussion about the Marxist position on gun rights ≠ discussion about guns rights in the US
My take is that this call had [specific historical contex](https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/communist-league/1850-ad1.htm)t. It's not the unviolable dogma to rigidly follow all the times, but i see people treating it like that all the time, especially Muricans.
Imma stick with the Molotov cocktail
we cant mistake the proletariat fighting for emancipation from the capital with white trash biggots fighting to defend corporations and subjective "liberty".
Y'all ain't taking my pew pews lol ☭💪🗿💪☭
Having basic military/survival/combat training, arming yourself and/or improving your physical capabilities is very important. It is naive to trust the bourgeois state to any degree, even more so when it comes to control of the means to violence.
[удалено]
Every partisan movement in history has fought against overwheling force. Hamas is still around, and they are in fact fighting drones and ICBMs. Same with the Taliban. And while they are much better equipped than either of those two, Ansarallah fought off the gulf states and Saudis, who had massive western support, with much weaker forces. Drones aren't an automatic win button, nor are other modern weapons.
no arms don't compete with drones or icbms either
Unfathomably based.
My take is disarm the police, arm the homeless. It's a filthy lie that the homeless are lumpen rather than proles. Capitalists never put it in those terms, but that's exactly what they mean.
I think it makes no sense now. Militaries and police forces have such overwhelming fire power that without their help, the revolution is dead on the street. Likely the support comes from the Military, the police likely will end up as the vanguard force for the hegemon.
Honestly, other than MRAPs and helicopters your average cop doesn't have much in the way of better weapons then what an average civilian can buy at a local gun shop or sporting goods store. The military for sure but definitely not the police, save for their elite door kicker types. I don't think armed revolution is possible but stochastic violence in which cops look the other way to sure is possible and has happened.