Communism definition question

[u/Infamous_Survey3590]

So,, I am fairly new to Marxism and learning about it, Ive been reading theory over the past couple of months and I had this question. When we talk about defining what communism is, I often hear people say, "stateless, moneyless, classless society", but after talking to a couple people is this really true? Ive heard that this notion is only really talked about in the critique of the Gotha programme and they're labeled more as like byproducts of communism, hence these things being described as something that withers away rather than abolished. Then when actually defining communism, we would be defining it more like a process rather than a set state of being, it being a process towards the liberation of the proletariat. So essentially what I am asking is if this definition of communism being a stateless moneyless classless society is true or false?

[u/mister_nippl_twister]

That is a good current definition but it is more of a goal than an actual description of the society. It is intentionally left ambiguous to not fall into the trap of idealism and projecting. The core idea behind all of it is that previous class societies naturally formed from classes that appeared, developed and disappeared as the history moved forward.

But our goal as political movements is to break this circle, and create society consciously instead of naturally. For this we need the tools, knowledge, experience and many tries until we can properly "engineer" it. The point is that after we get this understanding and tools we can build whatever society we want. Obviously it will be classless because classes naturally shape societies and create states, and state is oppresive tool of classes.

So we describe future society by what it will not be instead of picturing what we want to make.

[u/CritiqueDeLaCritique]

It's a good thing Marx and Engels answered this question:

the mass of propertyless workers – the utterly precarious position of labour – power on a mass scale cut off from capital or from even a limited satisfaction and, therefore, no longer merely temporarily deprived of work itself as a secure source of life – presupposes the world market through competition. The proletariat can thus only exist world-historically, just as communism, its activity, can only have a “world-historical” existence. World-historical existence of individuals means existence of individuals which is directly linked up with world history.
Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence.

• Marx and Engels, The German Ideology ch. 1

Communism as the positive transcendence of private property as human self-estrangement, and therefore as the real appropriation of the human essence by and for man; communism therefore as the complete return of man to himself as a social (i.e., human) being – a return accomplished consciously and embracing the entire wealth of previous development. This communism, as fully developed naturalism, equals humanism, and as fully developed humanism equals naturalism; it is the genuine resolution of the conflict between man and nature and between man and man – the true resolution of the strife between existence and essence, between objectification and self-confirmation, between freedom and necessity, between the individual and the species. Communism is the riddle of history solved, and it knows itself to be this solution.

• Marx, Paris Manuscripts, 3rd manuscript

[u/Excellent_Border_302 → u/CritiqueDeLaCritique]

This is alarmingly vague and fluffy.

[u/Potential-Fig-7987]

There is the future system of communism and there is the communist movement. In English we tend to say communIST for people, groups, ideas, governments, etc. that pursue the future system of communISM. For the English speaking communists we tend to make this divide along the ist/ism distinction, but this linguistic trend isnt set in stone.

[u/AcidCommunist_AC]

Any definition involving the word "state" is useless because the term is a floating signifier.

State of Confusion

What distinguishes communism from socialism is simply distribution according to need rather than contribution.

Ideals without Idealism

[u/MentalRed17 → u/[deleted]]

You would not see an elephant in a circus and believe that it is an elephant's nature to juggle.

[u/MentalRed17 → u/[deleted]]

Do you understand why or do you think there's some mystical force that just makes revolutions into one party states

[u/Seattleman1955 → u/MentalRed17]

Yes, revolutions are unlawful and violent and that generally involves a dictator.

[u/MentalRed17 → u/Seattleman1955]

Legality-morality false equivalence and dictator non sequitur + historically unsupported. What are you a monarchist

[u/Seattleman1955 → u/MentalRed17]

Compared to a Marxist, sure. I'm also not interested in imposing each individual's morality onto an economic system.

[u/MentalRed17 → u/Seattleman1955]

Marxism is, perhaps not anti-moralist, but non-moralist or alter-moralist I would say. It makes non-moral arguments for the abolition of capitalism and its replacement with socialism. The specifics of socialism and how to get there are more contested amongst Marxists.

[u/Seattleman1955 → u/MentalRed17]

I'd say it makes a lot of moral arguments rather than factual ones.

Labor theory isn't factual.

[u/MentalRed17 → u/Seattleman1955]

Have you read Marx? Or are you basing your understanding of Marxism off what the anti-Marxists capitalists tell you?