… [T]he first step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class to win the battle of democracy.So by turning the tables in a class war, it can abolish a class war? Not how it works. But by advocating “despotic inroads”, Marx admits that the only goal is for the “proletariat” to become the oppressor.
The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degree, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralize all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organized as the ruling class; and to increase the total productive forces as rapidly as possible.
Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionizing the mode of production. […]
… If the proletariat during its contest with the bourgeoisie is compelled, by the force of circumstances, to organize itself as a class—if, by means of a revolution, it makes itself the ruling class, and, as such, sweeps away by force the old conditions of production—then it will, along with these conditions, have swept away the conditions for the existence of class antagonisms and of classes generally, and will thereby have abolished its own supremacy as a class. …
Marx is more intellectually honest than his current supporters in the west. In order to convert from a free market economy to a centrally controlled communists economy the property and business owners will have to agree to give up their property (personal, intellectual, business) to the state.
Marx realized that it would have to be brought about by force. The dimwits today I guess believe that we’ll all just volunteer to give it up. Yeah, that’s gonna happen. I think the only time in history it ever happened was the 1871 Paris Commune which lasted a couple of months. Every other time, property was seized by force.
In a debate with a communist or anarchist, that is the question that I would ask. If we converted to a centrally controlled economy in America, how would you convince people to voluntarily give up all their possessions in order to be re-distributed by the state? If they are honest and say by force, then I would ask how are you any different than Stalin in the 20s? And they wonder why we love the 2nd Amendment....
Yes, the manifesto clearly indicates that the “dictatorship of the proletariat” is a necessary step in Communism, so anyone who says Communism is about liberation or stopping oppression either hasn’t understood the manifesto or is a liar.
What the manifesto doesn’t make so clear is that the “dictatorship” is necessarily not by the actual proletariats, but by a few select communist ideologues OVER the proletariats and everyone else, and that there is no real plan in communism to ever get beyond that dictatorship to any other system.