>the revolution should be led an elite vanguard (people who agree with me) that will stamp out any reactionary elements (people who disagree with me)>democracy is actually bad because the proletariat don’t know what’s good for themselves and they need a powerful genius (me) to engineer society for them How does anyone take this smug retard seriously?
>betrayed the Left SRs>betrayed Makhno>betrayed the Menshevik-Internationalists>betrayed Vpered>betrayed Kronstadtwhat was his fucking problem?
"its too bad he wasn't lazy"
>>18757187He was an ambitious opportunist as well as a self righteous midwit
>>18757180He saved Russia from germanic holstein-gottorp oppression
He's right about the plebs being fucking lunatics who don't know their asses from their elbows. He was wrong about a lot, but his elitism was a good quality
>>18757180Because he was descended from literal royalty and the Russian "revolution" was nothing more than a dynasty change.
>>18757255Lenin wished he was German his entire life. His chimpout cost Russia everything, Russia being part of the Versailles table would have helped stabilize its nascent democracy.
>>18757187Left SRs betrayed him, not the other way around, they just lost the subsequent power struggle
>>18757715Disagreeing with someone is not «betraying» them
He's right, though. The masses are retarded,
>>18757180>howCOMMUNISM KILLS
>>18758272They tried to assassinate him, anon. Killed the German ambassador too, to try to drag Russia back into WW1. There was a coup attempt and everything.
>>18757180Any successful revolution requires cohesive head guiding thr force of the masses. Or else you just get disparate chimp outs which you can ignore or easily crush one by one. The west can have so many "revolts" and "protests" precisely because theyre just chimpouts with no cohesive force or demands. And that if they do have a leader its some woman just waiving around plattitudes
>>18759719>guiding thr force of the masses.That's just some Marxist sunshine you're blowing up our asses. Force of the masses blah blah blah. The Bolsheviks won because they exercised effective control of the ARMED FORCES. The Russian army was rebelling and turfing out their officers and soldiers would elect their own representatives in military revolutionary committees. What the Bolsheviks were really good at was getting their own guys elected in these committees. It was like a parallel chain of authority under Lenin and Trotsky's control.
>>18759826Russia at the time had extensive conscription because of WW1, so the armed forces were just the masses (with guns)
>the revolution should be led an elite vanguard (people who agree with me) that will stamp out any reactionary elements (people who disagree with me)>democracy is actually bad because the proletariat don’t know what’s good for themselves and they need a powerful genius (me) to engineer society for themBoth points are true. Lenin did a lot of stupid shit in his life but vanguardism is the only political strategy which actually allowed socialists to take power. It was so good that revolutionary nationalists (in Turkey and China) as well as fascists (in Italy and Germany) copied it.
>>18759719>requires cohesive head guiding thr force of the massesIsn’t it convenient that the people who say this are always the ones who end up assuming that “guiding” role and stamping out anyone who slightly disagrees with them? Marxists are invariably either authoritarians or useless idiots who will eventually be killed by the authoritarians when they are no longer useful.
>>18757441not royalty, his family were petty nobles. His father however, grew up in actual serfdom but managed to get an education in maths and physics which made him enough money.
>>18759871>vanguardism is the only political strategy which actually allowed socialists to take powerThe socialists were already in power when Lenin started advocating for vanguardism. All it did was allow socialism to be hijacked by the most radical, most retarded university students in the movement. >It was so good that revolutionary nationalists (in Turkey and China) as well as fascists (in Italy and Germany) copied itAuthoritarians often copy other authoritarians, yes.
>>18760215>petty noblesI feel like some people forget just how fluid the definition of nobility could be or just how large it was in some countries since they're used to examples like Britain where less than 1% of the population had a noble title in the early modern period. iirc a little over 10% of the polish population had a hereditary noble title during the 1700s.
>>18757180>democracy is actually bad because the proletariat don’t know what’s good for themselves and they need a powerful genius (me) to engineer society for themThis one seems kinda universally true regardless of what your worldview is, no? For whatever personal definition you have of a "good" or "bad" society, I can find you some period of history for some nation/kingdom/empire/whatever else where there was mass popular support for whatever you think is terrible. There were times when millions of people genuinely thought having kings was a grand idea, or that getting rid of kings was a grand idea in case you yourself think kings were good. Or the same for oligarchies, democracies, anarchies, anything really.No matter what you think is the right way of ordering society, there are going to be millions of people who decide that that's stupid and want to do the opposite.
>>18760748The (stated) goal of the Russian revolution was to take power away from the wealthy elite and give it to the proletarian masses. Democracy with universal suffrage was a huge part of this plan that Lenin himself publicly advocated for until his Bolsheviks lost their first election. This is called being a “sore loser” and “ideologically inconsistent faggot”.
>>18759561>They tried to assassinate himthat will happen when you execute a bunch of random people
>>18760216>The socialists were already in power when Lenin started advocating for vanguardism.Heh.
>>18760852Some killings are genuinely for the greater good, "the ends justify the means" aren't just magic words to put into a villain's mouth.Lenin exited a capitalist, imperialist war that had already killed millions of Russians and the left SRs were trying to seize power to drag them back into it.
>>18761996>Some killings are genuinely for the greater goodThe problem is that “greater good” is subjective and the proponents of every political movement from militant fascism to liberal democracy and absolute monarchy believed that enacting their preferred form of government/society constituted a “greater good” which justified the suppression and execution of their opponents. In the case of Lenin specifically, it doesn’t seem like Bolshevism improved the material conditions for many Russians who weren’t directly involved in the political movement itself in the long run. >Lenin exited a capitalist, imperialist warThey weren’t mad that he exited the war, they were mad at the massive territorial concessions he made. It was probably the only call since the Russian military was in no condition to keep fighting, but the SR stance was that he could have withdrawn Russia without giving up any territory.
>>18757180He was right in the idea that democracy is a mistake, especially in developing countries. The average person will pick a leader who can talk in a way they like and have zero understanding about their policies, zero long term thought. Do you think that China would be what it is today had Deng Xiaoping decided to prioritize the will of illiterate peasants over that of the educated elites? ofc not. His authoritarian system of government wasnt perfect, but it was tremendously successful at industrializing Russia and then China.
>>18757180This is what socialism was like before Marx.
>>18757180Most people are NPCs that don't think for themselves. Often tricked into being brownshirts and foot soldiers for someone by the promise of something that anyone that can think more than 2 steps ahead knows is just BS to get free/cheap pawns.>>18757441Pretty much, most of the "revolutions" are just a noble/royal making a coup to take over due to getting the right backers the current head is weak at the moment. Now it has happen like the American Revolution with the founding father and Washington. However most of the time it's just someone taking the crown for themselves and promising things to those who back them.
