So why ain’t you geniuses blaming the sins of Capitalism and Imperialism on Adam Smith and John Locke?

Or the Spanish Inquisition on Jesus and Paul?

Should the genocide of the indigenous people in the Americas the fault of Jesus and his twelve disciples?

All fascist organizations are rabidly Roman Catholic, yet the Holy See isn’t blamed for Franco, Pinochet, Mussolini, etc.

Blaming everything on some opaque object with an opaque name like “bourgeoisie”… what kind of darn analysis is that? ;-) It’s like how certain people blame everything on “government”, or “the liberal media”, or “The Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy”, or “The Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy”, or “idiotarianism”. Just invent a opaque term which sounds bad and heap all the world’s ills onto it.

Marx is not “blaming”, per se…he is actually singing the praises of the “bourgeoisie” …he seems to admire a particular aspect of that particular class.

In a consumer society, something’s monetary value is, in most instances, IS IT”S VALUE.

Ray: um, this? “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.”

gkurtz: Well, that’s another way of looking at it. But if Marx is to be seen as a source of new insights, new ways of looking at things, new ways to frame old problems, etc…. then there are still some other questions: Can we (or not) get the same insights from, say, John Stuart Mill? How many of these new insights actually lead us anywhere in our efforts to understand the world? Also, I’m not sure if most democratic socialists derive their personal philosophies from Marx, or from other sources. (Then again, judging from the poll results, a sizeable number of them do. Heh.)

NeoDude: man, that’s not analysis. Blaming everything on some opaque object with an opaque name like “bourgeoisie”… what kind of darn analysis is that? ;-) It’s like how certain people blame everything on “government”, or “the liberal media”, or “The Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy”, or “The Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy”, or “idiotarianism”. Just invent a opaque term which sounds bad and heap all the world’s ills onto it.

Right, although he does seem to get carried away a little bit with his ‘it’s the economy, stupid’ idea.

It is true for the most part, yet quite often exploitation is still veiled by religious and political illusions, isn’t it? Feudal, patriarchal and idyllic relations still do exist, don’t they?

Well, the Communist Manifesto is not really a philosophical work, it’s more like a political pamphlet, hyperbole is understandable.

That comment makes sense only if you ignore about half of Marxist history. Leninism and its descendents were unmitigated disasters (or, better, crimes), but don’t forget that social democracy has been deeply influenced by Marx as well. Are you going to argue that social democracy, as a movement, hasn’t improved the world? That would be tough to demonstrate.

It’s about time we dropped the idiotic equation of Marxism with the tradition of Lenin & Stalin. Sure, most social democrats haven’t been “Marxists” in any orthodox sense since 1914 or so—but Communists were never Marxian Marxists either! It seems that Marx is held to a higher standard than other philosophers: those who voted for, say, Hume probably do not want Hume to be judged by whether his ideas would be appealing if turned into a narrow dogma, but by whether we do or don’t have a great deal to learn from Hume. I voted for Marx in that poll because I think we have a lot to learn from him; the critics of the big Marx vote seem, by and large, to assume that Marx is to be judged only as the Communists saw him—as the source of dogma (not that the Communists actually read Marx very carefully!)—and not as one source of insights among others (which is, of course, a way of approaching Marx more common among social democrats / democratic socialists).

The bourgeoisie, historically, has played a most revolutionary part.

The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors”, and has left no other nexus between people than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”. It has drowned out the most heavenly ecstacies of religious fervor, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom—Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.

The bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honored and looked up to with reverent awe. It has converted the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science, into its paid wage laborers.

The bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation into a mere money relation.

Predictions are not the only part of philosophy, you idjuts!, analysis is one of philosophy’s bestest thangs!

Also, the nice thing about reading crystal-ball predictions is that you can select which predictions to talk about. One can look at Marx’s incorrect predictions and lambast him as a total idiot; one can also look at Marx’s correct predictions and praise him for his exceptionally keen foresight. But the simple fact is that Marx was absolutely right in some things and absolutely wrong in others.

To improve the world is the goal of political activists. Marx was a political activist too, but that’s a different story.

Or maybe Marxism is great precisely because it helps to serve as a warning to others. Heh.

This is freakin’ rich!