ProleWiki - User contributions [en]

Contradiction

2026-02-28T18:00:01Z

Comrade Kiwi: Rectified the page somewhat, might work on it more later.

[[File:Yin and Yang symbol.svg|thumb|128px|The modern [[Yin-yang]] is a illustration of contradiction.]]

The '''contradiction''' is the fundamental mechanism behind [[dialectics]]. A contradiction is a coexistent<ref group="lower-alpha">''existing at the same time''</ref> diametrical<ref group="lower-alpha">''at opposite ends, in direct opposition''</ref> link between two forces. Contradictions exist when two requirements are met:

# Two forces must be diametrically opposed and
# one cannot exist without the other.<ref>{{citation|author=Mao Zedong|mia=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|chapter=V. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Identity_and_Struggle_of_the_Aspects_of_a_Contradiction|The Identity and Struggle of the Aspects of a Contradiction]]|year=1937|city=[[Yan'an]]|quote=…the existence of each of the two aspects of a contradiction in the process of the development of a thing presupposes the existence of the other aspect, and both aspects coexist in a single entity….}}</ref>
In dialectics, a contradiction is the engine of motion, which moves itself in the process of self-transformation of the conditions in which it exists. This transformation then creates new contradictions, called [[negation of the negation]], this entails the process of intrinsic contradictions within all that exists. The science of dialectics is the science of process itself i.e. understanding how and what motion entails within material conditions.

For example, the [[bourgeoisie]] form a contradiction to the [[proletariat]]. The former wants to make their workers work greater [[Surplus-value|surplus yield]] from the latter, while the latter wants to maximize the amount paid in [[Wage|wage-labor]]. The contradiction cannot be "moved past" because the very structural compulsions of capital, the drive to maximize profit entail wage suppression; the contradiction thus produces [[Antagonistic contradictions|antagonisms]] between classes, birthing both reactionary and revolutionary moments, both co-constituting each other in their existence as opposed to each other.

== Primary and secondary contradictions ==
Contradictions are separated into primary and secondary categories. Secondary contradictions stand on on primary ones as their ground for existence or rather, primary contradictions being causal structure secondary contradictions which operate with their own internal structure but in tandem with all other contradictions.

Secondary contradictions are not "resolved through resolving primary contradictions" as [[Mechanical materialism|vulgar materialists]] suggest, rather the resolution of secondary contradictions allow for the capacity to systematically address primary contradictions. Consider the secondary contradiction of race, it is structured by class society and economic [[Relations of production|modes of production]] whilst simultaneously having its own internal logic and operational structure that doesn't reduce to "just class". Racial supremacy and capital exist in a symbiotic relationship, where capital is the ground on which racial supremacy entrenches itself.

In combatting capital, we combat racial supremacy, and in combatting racialism, we combat capital itself. By resolving the primary contradiction, we unentrench racial supermacy and thus gain the capacity to combat it effectively.

== Solving contradictions ==
A contradiction is resolved when the struggle gives form to new relations whilst the decaying relata are made irrelevant to the motion of the totality; i.e. when the conditions in which the contradiction constitutes itself stop existing, through its own very struggle to end the contradiction can we say the contradiction was resolved.

The proletariat, in being the class that encompasses most of humanity unlike past classes which were themselves gradations in a multi-hierarchical structure, is the class posed to resolve not just the contradiction of proletarian-bourgeois, but of class society itself. In annihilating the basis for private ownership and socializing the [[means of production]], the proletarian class negates the very basis of class society, i.e. surplus. With no class with privileged ownership of the means of production, class as viable existent dissolves itself leading to classless society, or [[communism]].

However, the communist stage of society is not the end of process, but the end of antagonistic contradictions. In its place [[non-antagonistic contradictions]]<nowiki/>take place as the engine of motion. These contradictions require synthesis, and not the domination or annihilation of one relata over another.

An example can be the non-antagonistic contradiction between humans and nature. We are part of the nature, and it is in our interest to simultaneously extract from it and preserve it. The goal becoming to find a synthetic and active manner to deal with the non-antagonistic contradiction, which becomes the basis for societal development.

==Universality==
The fact that contradiction is universal necessitates two prerequisites; these being that all things posses within them, internal contradiction and secondly, the contradiction exists through the whole of the process.<ref>{{Citation|author=Mao Zedong|year=1937|title=On Contradiction|title-url=https://en.prolewiki.org/wiki/Library:On_contradiction|chapter=II. The Universality of Contradiction|quote=The universality or absoluteness of contradiction has a twofold meaning. One is that contradiction exists in the process of development of all things, and the other is that in the process of development of each thing a movement of opposites exists from beginning to end.}}</ref> {{quote|Contradiction is universal and absolute, it is present in the process of development of all things and permeates every process from beginning to end.|[[Mao Zedong]]|[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|[[Library:On_contradiction#The_Universality_of_Contradiction|The Universality of Contradiction]]}}

===Particularity===

The particularity of contradictions refer to a contradiction that forms the distinct process of a thing, within a larger totality. Mao noted that it is important to study the particular contradictions of a thing to qualitatively distinguish it from other things.<ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|chapter=III. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Particularity_of_Contradiction|The Particularity of Contradiction]]|author=Mao Zedong|year=1937|mia=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm|quote=But what is especially important and necessary, constituting as it does the foundation of our knowledge of a thing, is to observe what is particular to this form of motion of matter, namely, to observe the qualitative difference between this form of motion and other forms. Only when we have done so can we distinguish between things. Every form of motion contains within itself its own particular contradiction. This particular contradiction constitutes the particular essence which distinguishes one thing from another. It is the internal cause or, as it may be called, the basis for the immense variety of things in the world. … All these forms are interdependent, but in its essence each is different from the others. The particular essence of each form of motion is determined by its own particular contradiction. This holds true not only for nature but also for social and ideological phenomena. Every form of society, every form of ideology, has its own particular contradiction and particular essence.}}</ref> Humans study the particular contradiction of a process to distinguish it from other processes. This leads to common knowledge of a set of processes, which in turn aids in the study of particularities. Our knowledge of the cosmos for example, is a study of the particularity of the extra-earth conditions, and the particularity itself stems from other process such spectroscopy (study of wavelengths of light) or photometry (analysis of visual brightness, structures etc to determine particular phenomena within the cosmos), demonstrating interconnection.

Mao and Lenin warned against viewing only part of a contradiction (or one-sidedness), as this leads to misunderstanding the contradiction.<ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:Once Again On The Trade Unions, The Current Situation and the Mistakes of Trotsky and Buhkarin|Once Again On The Trade Unions, The Current Situation and the Mistakes of Trotsky and Buhkarin]]|author=[[Vladimir Lenin]]|mia=https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/jan/25.htm|year=1921|quote=Firstly, if we are to have a true knowledge of an object we must look at and examine all its facets, its connections and “mediacies”. That is something we cannot ever hope to achieve completely, but the rule of comprehensiveness is a safeguard against mistakes and rigidity.}}</ref><ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|author=Mao Zedong|year=1937|chapter=III. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Particularity_of_Contradiction|The Particularity of Contradiction]]|mia=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm|quote=In studying a problem, we must shun subjectivity, one-sidedness and superficiality. … To be one-sided means not to look at problems all-sidedly… . In a word, it means not to understand the characteristics of both aspects of a contradiction. This is what we mean by looking at a problem one-sidedly. Or it may be called seeing the part but not the whole, seeing the trees but not the forest. That way it is impossible to kind the method for resolving a contradiction, it is impossible to accomplish the tasks of the revolution, to carry out assignments well or to develop inner-Party ideological struggle correctly.}}</ref> Mao also warned against superficiality, which is not viewing both the totality and the individuality of a contradiction.<ref name=superficial>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|chapter=III. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Particularity_of_Contradiction|The Particularity of Contradiction]]|year=1937|author=Mao Zedong|mia=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm|quote=To be superficial means to consider neither the characteristics of a contradiction in its totality nor the characteristics of each of its aspects; it means to deny the necessity for probing deeply into a thing and minutely studying the characteristics of its contradiction, but instead merely to look from afar and, after glimpsing the rough outline, immediately to try to resolve the contradiction (to answer a question, settle a dispute, handle work, or direct a military operation). … }}</ref> The result of applying both superficiality and one-sidedness is the loss of the holistic analysis which understands the motion of the whole.<ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|chapter=III. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Particularity_of_Contradiction|The Particularity of Contradiction]]|year=1937|author=Mao Zedong|mia=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm|quote=To be one-sided and superficial is at the same time to be subjective. For all objective things are actually interconnected and are governed by inner laws, but instead of undertaking the task of reflecting things as they really are some people only look at things one-sidedly or superficially and who know neither their interconnections nor their inner laws, and so their method is subjectivist.}}</ref>

== Principality ==

A principal contradiction is the sole contradiction in a thing that determines the existence and development of other contradictions.<ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|author=Mao Zedong|chapter=IV. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Principal_Contradiction_and_the_Principal_Aspect_of_a_Contradiction|The Principal Contradiction and the Principal Aspect of a Contradiction]]|year=1937|quote=There are many contradictions in the process of development of a complex thing, and one of them is necessarily the principal contradiction whose existence and development determine or influence the existence and development of the other contradictions.}}</ref>

A principal force (or aspect) is the dominant force in a contradiction.<ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|author=Mao Zedong|chapter=IV. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Principal_Contradiction_and_the_Principal_Aspect_of_a_Contradiction|The Principal Contradiction and the Principal Aspect of a Contradiction]]|year=1937|quote=But, in any given contradiction, whether principal or secondary, should the two contradictory aspects be treated as equal? Again, no. In any contradiction the development of the contradictory aspects is uneven. Sometimes they seem to be in equilibrium, which is however only temporary and relative, while unevenness is basic. Of the two contradictory aspects, one must be principal and the other secondary. The principal aspect is the one playing the leading role in the contradiction. The nature of a thing is determined mainly by the principal aspect of a contradiction, the aspect which has gained the dominant position.}}</ref> The principality of forces in a contradiction can change.<ref>{{Citation|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|author=Mao Zedong|chapter=IV. [[Library:On_contradiction#The_Principal_Contradiction_and_the_Principal_Aspect_of_a_Contradiction|The Principal Contradiction and the Principal Aspect of a Contradiction]]|year=1937|quote=…the principal and the non-principal aspects of a contradiction transform themselves into each other and the nature of the thing changes accordingly. In a given process or at a given stage in the development of a contradiction, A is the principal aspect and B is the non-principal aspect; at another stage or in another process the roles are reversed--a change determined by the extent of the increase or decrease in the force of each aspect in its struggle against the other in the course of the development of a thing.}}</ref>

== Identity ==

Identity refers to the ''material'' linked coexistence of both aspects in a contradiction and that the contradictory aspects conditionally transform into their opposites.<ref>{{Citation|quote=Identity, unity, coincidence, interpenetration, interpermeation, interdependence (or mutual dependence for existence), interconnection or mutual co-operation--all these different terms mean the same thing and refer to the following two points: first, the existence of each of the two aspects of a contradiction in the process of the development of a thing presupposes the existence of the other aspect, and both aspects coexist in a single entity; second, in given conditions, each of the two contradictory aspects transforms itself into its opposite. This is the meaning of identity.}}</ref> Identity exists conditionally.<ref>{{Citation|author=V. I. [[Lenin]]|title=Conspectus of Hegel's The Science of Logic, Collected Works Russian Edition|city=Moscow|year=1958|volume=XXXVIII|page=97-98|quote=Dialectics is the teaching which shows how opposites can be and how they happen to be (how they become) identical--under what conditions they are identical, transforming themselves into one another, why the human mind should take these opposites not as dead, rigid, but as living, conditional, mobile, transforming themselves into one another.}}</ref>

== Contradictions in the class struggle ==
In [[Europe]], before the bourgeoisie [[Class struggle|was opposed to the proletariat]], they were opposed to the [[nobility]]. The bourgeoisie was born out of the material conditions of the late Middle Ages: in free cities, artisans hired workers by the day and bought their labour power. This was a different relation to labour from the feudal lord and his serfs, as the serfs were not "free" to choose their employer or the nature of their work; the serf was locked to his lord's land, unable to freely travel or choose his occupation.

The bourgeoisie thus wanted to have more free workers available to expand their businesses (and have people to sell their products to), while nobles and lords wanted more serfs to increase their power and personal wealth. This lead to many violent uprisings and clashes, including the [[European wars of religion|wars of religion in Europe]] (Catholic leaders were mostly feudal lords and Protestants were by and large bourgeois).

Eventually, after several centuries, the bourgeoisie won over the feudal lords and became the dominant class in society, controlling the state and able to pass laws favouring them (e.g. putting an end to the serf system). This slowly created a proletariat, and phased out the noble class over time who either became part of the bourgeoisie or were executed. Today, the contradiction is not between feudal lords and the bourgeoisie anymore, but between the bourgeoisie and proletariat.

As the proletariat will themselves become the dominant class in society, they will naturally phase out the bourgeoisie and create new contradictions out of this qualitative change and the class struggle will continue.

== Other examples ==

* Saturation and starvation form a contradiction; saturation is diametrically opposed to starvation, as one cannot be saturated and starved at the same time. Starvation also must coexist with saturation, otherwise it would be impossible to starve without the need for saturation.
* In warfare, attack and defence form a contradiction; defence is the diametrical opposite of the attack (rule 1) and there is no need for defence if there is no attack (rule 2).
* ''Life'' and ''death''. Life is diametrically opposed to death and something is either dead or alive, but never both at once.
* Void versus phenomena. This plays out in several ways. Darkness and light. Heat and cold. Darkness is the absence of light. Cold is the absence of heat.

==Further Reading==

* {{Citation|author=Mao Zedong|mia=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_17.htm|title=[[Library:On contradiction|On contradiction]]|year=1937|city=[[Yan'an]]}}
* {{Citation|author=Friedrich Engels|year=1883|title=Dialectics of nature|mia=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1883/don/index.htm}}
* {{Citation|author=[[Nikolai Bukharin]]|year=1925|title=Historical Materialism|mia=https://www.marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1921/histmat/index.htm}}

==References==
<references />

===Notes===
<references group=lower-alpha />

[[Category:Marxist theory]][[Category:Marxist terminology]][[Category:Dialectical materialism]]

Essay:A thousand chains we will have to break

2026-02-17T16:22:32Z

Comrade Kiwi:

{{Infobox essay|title=A thousand chains we will have to break|author=Comrade Kiwi|date=2025-11-15|excerpt=What is the morality of the communist? What are our ethics? On what basis? The morality adequate to our struggle is not the morality of the ruling class dressed as universal ethics but the morality born from the recognition that our liberation requires their expropriation, that our humanity requires the negation of their inhumanity, that our flourishing requires the transformation of the system that produces our immiseration.|image=Hammersicklebanner.png}}

<blockquote><big>“Be moderate,” the trimmers cry,</big>

<big>Who dread the tyrants’ thunder.</big>

<big>“You ask too much and people fly</big>

<big>From you aghast in wonder.”</big>

<big>’Tis passing strange, for I declare</big>

<big>Such statements give me mirth,</big>

<big>'''For our demands most moderate are,'''</big>

<big>'''''We only want the earth.'''''</big>

</blockquote>'''<big>- James Connolly</big>'''

= '''<big>Death upon struggle through struggle</big>''' =

== I. The question of morality ==

What morality do you speak of? What morality do you seek?

The liberal extends his hand and speaks of universal human values, of dignity inherent to all, of rights transcending material conditions. He speaks as if morality descended from heaven, eternal and unchanging, waiting to be discovered by enlightened minds.

'''This is mystification. This is the morality of those who crush speaking the language of those who are crushed.'''

The morality of the proletariat is not detached but '''concrete'''. It is not discovered but '''forged'''. It is not eternal but '''historical'''. It emerges not from contemplation but from '''struggle''', from the realization that the struggle is not imaginary but '''material''', not philosophical but '''visceral''', not distant but '''immediate'''.

'''Our morality is born in the factory where the worker's body is ground to produce surplus value. Our morality is born in the slum where children die of preventable disease because medicine serves profit, not need. Our morality is born in the field where the farmer hangs himself because debt compounds while grain rots in warehouses.'''

This is not sentiment. This is material reality demanding response. The morality that emerges from this reality is not universal brotherhood but class war. '''Not an abstract notion of humanity but concrete humanity as it exists within objective reality.'''

== II. The mystification of humanity ==
You appeal to humanity. You say: all humans are one, all deserve dignity, all are brothers.

But ''which'' ''humanity''? The humanity of the ruling class, standing outside history, outside class, outside the brutal material relations that structure every moment of existence? '''This humanity does not exist'''. It is phantom, an enemy construct deployed precisely to obscure the reality that humanity is fractured, divided, set against itself by the mode of production that constitutes it.

Are you one with Ambani, whose wealth accumulates while workers starve? Are you one with Adani, whose ports and power plants displace tribals and destroy ecosystems? Are you one with Tata, whose steel mills and automobile factories extract surplus from your labor, whose mansions rise on your exploitation?

'''No. You. Are. Not.'''

To them, you are not human in the same sense they are human. You are resource, instrument, means to accumulation. Your suffering is '''externality''', your death is '''statistic''', your resistance is '''disruption''' to be managed or crushed.

The gaze of the oppressor looks down. It sees not equals but lesser beings whose natural position is '''subordination'''. The Brahmin looks at the Dalit and sees '''pollution'''. The capitalist looks at the worker and sees '''cost'''. The imperialist looks at the colonized and sees '''primitive accumulation waiting to happen'''.

This is not mere prejudice to be overcome through education. This is not individual failing to be corrected through moral improvement. '''This is structural necessity produced by material relations of domination.'''

When capital requires exploitation, it ''produces'' ideology that '''justifies''' exploitation. When caste requires hierarchy, it ''produces'' ideology that '''naturalizes''' hierarchy. When imperialism requires subjugation, it ''produces'' ideology that '''rationalizes''' subjugation.

'''To appeal to abstract humanity while these structures persist is not moral but mystification. It hides the material base of oppression behind the veil of universal values. It substitutes the concrete demand for liberation with the abstract hope for recognition.'''

== III. The concrete against the detached ==
'''Our struggle is not fictional. The social murder of our people is concrete. The death of a child because sustaining life does not serve capital is concrete. The starvation of a family because subsistence wages ensure maximum extraction is concrete. The annihilation of every livable condition while productive capacity has never been higher is concrete.'''

What do you tell the worker whose lungs fill with silica dust in the mine? That all humanity is one? What do you tell the mother whose child dies because the hospital demands payment she cannot provide? That human dignity is universal? What do you tell the farmer drowning in debt while his harvest is purchased below cost of production? That we are all brothers?

These are not answers. These are ''evasions''. These are the comfortable ruling class notions of those whose material conditions allow them the luxury of detachment and mystification.

'''The worker does not need to be told about universal humanity. The worker needs the means of subsistence guaranteed, the exploitation ended, the structures that produce his misery overthrown.'''

The morality of struggle recognizes this. It refuses disembodiment because disembodiment serves those who benefit from obscuring material reality. '''It refuses universalism because universalism erases the particularity of oppression and the necessity of particular struggle.'''

'''Our morality is partisan. It takes sides. It recognizes comrades and enemies not in the liberal sense of difference of opinion but in the material sense of opposing class interests. The worker and the capitalist do not have competing values requiring ''dialogue''. They have antagonistic material interests requiring ''struggle''.'''

== IV. The task of the communist ==
'''The task of the communist is simple in formulation, infinite in implication: to annihilate the gaze of superiority by annihilating the material base that produces it.'''

Not to ''convince'' the Brahmin that Dalits are human. But to destroy the caste system that produces the Brahmin's privilege and the Dalit's oppression.

Not to ''teach'' the capitalist to treat workers fairly. But to expropriate the capitalist's property and socialize the means of production.

Not to ''appeal'' to the imperialist's better nature. But to break the chains of imperialist extraction and build independent development.

The oppressor shows you no mercy. He crushes you and calls it development. He extracts surplus value and calls it opportunity. He displaces you from your land and calls it progress. He shatters your social structures and calls it modernization.

And you would show him kindness? You would appeal to his humanity? You would extend moral regard to a rock, to a force of nature, to a system that operates by its own logic of accumulation regardless of human cost?

'''This is not morality but masochism. This is not ethics but capitulation dressed in the language of universal love.'''

The morality of the communist recognizes that liberation requires not conversion but conquest. Not of individual capitalists' hearts but of the capitalist mode of production itself. Not of individual oppressors' minds but of the ''structures'' that produce oppression.

== V. The morality of liberation ==
'''Let our morality be the morality of struggle. Let it be tested not in intellectual philosophical debate but in material transformation of wretched conditions. Let it be measured not by how closely it approaches eternal values but by how effectively it advances liberation.'''

The morality that says "''do not resist violently''" serves the oppressor, who reserves violence for himself as monopoly. The morality that says "''all sides have valid concerns''" serves the ruling class, whose concern is continued domination. The morality that says "''change must be gradual''" serves those who benefit from present arrangements while those who suffer are told to wait.

We reject this ruling class morality. Not because we are immoral but because we recognize morality as historically conditioned, class-determined, and materially grounded. '''The morality adequate to our struggle is not the morality of the ruling class dressed as universal ethics but the morality born from the recognition that our liberation requires their expropriation, that our humanity requires the negation of their inhumanity, that our flourishing requires the transformation of the system that produces our immiseration.''' This is the morality of the march of history grounded by objective reality's transformation.

'''This is not cruelty but clarity. This is not barbarism but recognition that the barbarism is present, operating, crushing lives daily in the name of development, progress, and natural law.'''

'''Let our morality be the morality of the concrete: the concrete suffering demanding concrete response. Let it be the morality of the wretched of the earth becoming its stewards, taking what was stolen, building what was destroyed, liberating what was bound.'''

== VI. The revolutionary stance ==
When the liberal asks "''do you not believe in human rights?''" we answer: '''we believe in the right of the worker to the full product of his labor. We believe in the right of the peasant to the land he works. We believe in the right of the oppressed to expropriate the oppressor. These are the rights that are fundamental, for they are the material conditions of all other rights.'''

When the moralist asks "''do you not believe in non-violence''?" we answer: '''we believe in ending the violence of starvation, of preventable disease, of social murder. We believe in ending the structural violence that kills more surely than any revolutionary's gun. If you call this violence, ''then we are violent''. If you call justice for the oppressed extremism, ''then we are extremist''. We will not apologize for demanding what is ours by right of having produced it.'''

When the humanist asks "''do you not believe in the brotherhood of man''?" we answer: '''we believe in the solidarity of the exploited. We believe in the unity of the working class across artificial divisions. We believe in international proletarian solidarity against international capital. But we do not believe in brotherhood with those who profit from our exploitation. Oppressor and oppressed are not brothers. They are enemies in class war that the oppressor pretends does not exist.'''

<big>'''Our morality, then, is this: we side with life against the forces of death. We side with the producers against the parasites. We side with the oppresssed against the oppressor. We side with the future against the ''present arrangement that strangles it''. We side with liberation against all that impedes it.'''</big>

This is '''not''' relativism. This is '''not''' nihilism. This is recognition that morality adequate to revolutionary transformation cannot be the morality that rationalizes what must be transformed. It must be born from struggle, tested in practice, measured by its contribution to liberation.

== VII. Death upon struggle through struggle ==
The ruling class offers you this morality: love your enemy, wait for justice, trust the process, respect the law, believe in gradual reform. '''Every one of these demands serves their interest. Every one asks you to wait while they accumulate. Every one asks you to be patient while children go hungry. Every one asks you to be peaceful while structural violence grinds you down.'''

The communists posits something else: '''the morality of struggle.''' The morality that recognizes your enemy and names him. The morality that ''demands'' what is yours and ''takes'' it. '''The morality that builds in the process of fighting, that transforms in the process of destroying, that creates the new world in the shell of the old.'''

This morality says: organize where you are. Fight where you stand. Link your immediate material interests to the long-term interest of the working class. '''Recognize that your liberation and the capitalist's loss are not separate questions but one question with one answer: the overthrow of the system that produces both.'''

This morality says: you owe nothing to those who crush you. Your debt is to those who struggle alongside you. Your obligation is to the future we will build when we have seized what we produced and organize it for human need rather than capital accumulation.

'''Let our morality be this: from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.'''

'''Let our ethics be this: seize the means of production.'''

'''Let our politics be this: smash the bourgeois state and build the dictatorship of the proletariat.'''

'''Let our practice be this: organize, agitate, educate, mobilize, revolt.'''

'''Death upon struggle through struggle. End the class war by winning it. Annihilate exploitation by annihilating the exploiter's economic power. Transform the wretched of the earth into its stewards not through appeal to the mercy of our oppressors but through organized collective force that makes our oppression impossible.'''

'''This is communist morality. This is proletarian ethics. This is the only morality adequate to our task: the liberation of humanity from class society, from exploitation, from alienation, from all the chains that capital has forged.'''

'''The choice is simple: ruling class morality that rationalizes what is, or concrete morality that fights for what must be. The morality of the bourgeoisie, or the morality of the proletariat. The morality that asks us to wait, or the morality that demands we seize.'''

'''<big>We choose the morality of liberation. We choose the morality of struggle. We choose the morality of the wretched becoming the stewards of the earth they made with their labor and will remake with their victory.</big>'''

'''<big>Today we are nothing, tomorrow we will be everything!</big>'''
[[Category:Essays]]
[[Category:Essays by Comrade Kiwi]]
[[Category:Agitprop (essays)]]

2025-11-14T18:38:14Z

Comrade Kiwi:

2025-11-01T19:10:15Z

Comrade Kiwi:

2025-10-27T12:42:27Z

Comrade Kiwi: Done with the entire Feuerbach article, reworked it thoroughly.

'''Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach''' (1804–1872) was a German philosopher who developed a [[Materialism|materialist]] critique of [[religion]] and [[Objective idealism|Hegelian idealism]]. Feuerbach represents the pinnacle of pre-[[Marxism|Marxist]] materialism and played a crucial role in the development of [[Karl Marx|Marx]] and [[Friedrich Engels|Engels']] philosophical thought, even as they ultimately moved beyond his limitations.

== Feuerbach's philosophy ==
Materialism against Hegelian idealism: Feuerbach rejected [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|Hegel's]] objective idealism, which posited that the [[Geist|Absolute Idea (Geist)]] was the foundation of reality. Instead, Feuerbach insisted that material, natural existence was primary, and that consciousness was derived from material being.

As Feuerbach famously declared, "Man is what he eats" (Der Mensch ist was er isst), emphasizing, literally, the material, bodily basis of human existence against [[Idealism|idealist]] abstractions.<ref>{{Web citation|author=Ludwig Feuerbach|title=Die Naturwissenschaft und die Revolution|date=1850|url=https://www.ludwig-feuerbach.de/natur_rev.htm|quote=Der Mensch ist was er isst.}}</ref>

Critique of religion: Feuerbach's most influential work, '<nowiki/>''[[The Essence of Christianity]]'<nowiki/>'' (1841), argued that religion is a human creation, a projection of humanity's own nature onto an imaginary divine being. God is not the creator of man; rather, man creates God by externalizing and alienating his own human essence.<blockquote>RELIGION is the disuniting of man from himself; he sets God before him as the antithesis of himself God is not what man is – man is not what God is. God is the infinite, man the finite being; God is perfect, man imperfect; God eternal, man temporal; God almighty, man weak; God holy, man sinful. God and man are extremes: God is the absolutely positive, the sum of all realities; man the absolutely negative, comprehending all negations.

But in religion man contemplates his own latent nature. Hence it must be shown that this antithesis, this differencing of God and man, with which religion begins, is a differencing of man with his own nature.<ref>{{Web citation|author=Ludwig Feuerbach|newspaper=Marxists.org|title=Essence of Christianity: PART I, The True or Anthropological Essence of Religion

Chapter II. God as a Being of the Understanding|date=1841|url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/feuerbach/works/essence/ec02.htm|quote=RELIGION is the disuniting of man from himself; he sets God before him as the antithesis of himself God is not what man is – man is not what God is. God is the infinite, man the finite being; God is perfect, man imperfect; God eternal, man temporal; God almighty, man weak; God holy, man sinful. God and man are extremes: God is the absolutely positive, the sum of all realities; man the absolutely negative, comprehending all negations.

But in religion man contemplates his own latent nature. Hence it must be shown that this antithesis, this differencing of God and man, with which religion begins, is a differencing of man with his own nature.}}</ref></blockquote>For Feuerbach, theology is merely anthropology in disguise. When humans worship God's love, wisdom, or justice, they are actually worshiping idealized human qualities projected outward.

== Marx and Engels' engagement with Feuerbach ==
Feuerbach greatly influenced the [[Young Hegelians]], including Marx and Engels. His materialism provided the philosophical weapon to overthrow Hegelian idealism. As Engels recalled:<blockquote>Then came Feuerbach’s ''Essence of Christianity''[D]. With one blow, it pulverized the contradiction, in that without circumlocutions it placed materialism on the throne again. Nature exists independently of all philosophy. It is the foundation upon which we human beings, ourselves products of nature, have grown up. Nothing exists outside nature and man, and the higher beings our religious fantasies have created are only the fantastic reflection of our own essence. The spell was broken; the “system” was exploded and cast aside, and the contradiction, shown to exist only in our imagination, was dissolved. One must himself have experienced the liberating effect of this book to get an idea of it. Enthusiasm was general; we all became at once Feuerbachians. How enthusiastically Marx greeted the new conception and how much — in spite of all critical reservations — he was influenced by it, one may read in the ''The Holy Family''[E].<ref>{{Web citation|author=Frederick Engels|newspaper=Marxists.org|title=Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy

Part 1: Hegel|date=1886|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch01.htm|quote=Then came Feuerbach’s Essence of Christianity[D]. With one blow, it pulverized the contradiction, in that without circumlocutions it placed materialism on the throne again. Nature exists independently of all philosophy. It is the foundation upon which we human beings, ourselves products of nature, have grown up. Nothing exists outside nature and man, and the higher beings our religious fantasies have created are only the fantastic reflection of our own essence. The spell was broken; the “system” was exploded and cast aside, and the contradiction, shown to exist only in our imagination, was dissolved. One must himself have experienced the liberating effect of this book to get an idea of it. Enthusiasm was general; we all became at once Feuerbachians. How enthusiastically Marx greeted the new conception and how much — in spite of all critical reservations — he was influenced by it, one may read in the The Holy Family[E].}}</ref></blockquote>However, Marx and Engels quickly moved beyond Feuerbach, recognizing the limitations of his materialism.

== Limitations of Feuerbach's materialism ==
While Feuerbach broke with idealism, his materialism remained contemplative rather than practical, and [[Mechanical materialism|mechanical]] rather than [[Dialectics|dialectical]].

=== Contemplative, not practical materialism ===
Feuerbach understood reality as an object of contemplation and perception, not as the product of human [[Subjectivity|practical activity]].<blockquote>The chief defect of all hitherto existing materialism – that of Feuerbach included – is that the thing, reality, sensuousness, is conceived only in the form of the ''object or of contemplation'', but not as ''sensuous human activity, practice'', not subjectively. Hence, in contradistinction to materialism, the ''active'' side was developed abstractly by idealism – which, of course, does not know real, sensuous activity as such.<ref>{{Web citation|author=Karl Marx|newspaper=Marxists.org|title=Theses On Feuerbach|date=1845|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/theses.htm|quote=The chief defect of all hitherto existing materialism – that of Feuerbach included – is that the thing, reality, sensuousness, is conceived only in the form of the object or of contemplation, but not as sensuous human activity, practice, not subjectively. Hence, in contradistinction to materialism, the active side was developed abstractly by idealism – which, of course, does not know real, sensuous activity as such.}}</ref></blockquote>Feuerbach's materialism was passive, humans observe and contemplate nature but do not transform it through labor and practice. This meant Feuerbach could not understand that human consciousness and human nature itself are products of historical practice, not eternal givens.

=== Ahistorical and abstract conception of human nature ===
Feuerbach posited an eternal, unchanging human essence or "species-being" that exists outside of history and social relations.<blockquote>Feuerbach resolves the religious essence into the human essence. But the human essence is no abstraction inherent in each single individual.
In its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations.

Feuerbach, who does not enter upon a criticism of this real essence, is consequently compelled:

* To abstract from the historical process and to fix the religious sentiment as something by itself and to presuppose an abstract – isolated – human individual.

* Essence, therefore, can be comprehended only as “genus”, as an internal, dumb generality which naturally unites the many individuals.<ref>{{Web citation|author=Karl Marx|newspaper=Marxists.org|title=Theses On Feuerbach|date=1845|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/theses.htm|quote=Feuerbach resolves the religious essence into the human essence. But the human essence is no abstraction inherent in each single individual.

In its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations.

Feuerbach, who does not enter upon a criticism of this real essence, is consequently compelled:

To abstract from the historical process and to fix the religious sentiment as something by itself and to presuppose an abstract – isolated – human individual.
Essence, therefore, can be comprehended only as “genus”, as an internal, dumb generality which naturally unites the many individuals.}}</ref>
</blockquote>Because Feuerbach viewed human nature as a fixed essence rather than as historically produced through [[Relations of production|social relations]] and labor, he could not understand:

- How different [[Mode of production|modes of production]] create different forms of consciousness.

- How class society produces [[alienation]].

- How revolutionary transformation of society transforms human nature itself.

=== Inability to grasp revolutionary practice ===
Feuerbach's contemplative materialism left him unable to understand the transformation of the world through revolutionary practice. Marx's eleventh and most famous thesis on Feuerbach emphasizes this:<blockquote>The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it.<ref>{{Web citation|author=Karl Marx|newspaper=Marxists.org|title=Theses On Feuerbach|date=1845|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/theses/theses.htm|quote=The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it.}}</ref></blockquote>Feuerbach could critique religion intellectually, but he could not understand that religion would only be abolished through the revolutionary transformation of the material conditions that produce religious alienation, i.e., [[class society]] and [[exploitation]].

=== Mechanical, not dialectical ===

Feuerbach rejected Hegel's dialectics along with his idealism, throwing out the rational kernel with the mystical shell. He failed to develop a materialist dialectics. Without dialectics, Feuerbach could not grasp development, contradiction, and qualitative transformation, the tools necessary for understanding historical change and revolution.

== From Feuerbach to historical materialism ==
Marx and Engels synthesized Feuerbach's materialism with Hegel's dialectics to create [[dialectical materialism]] and [[historical materialism]].

From Feuerbach, they took:

* The materialist critique of idealism.
* The understanding that consciousness is derived from material being.
* The critique of religion as human self-alienation.

From Hegel, they took:

* The dialectical method (development through contradiction).
* The historical approach.
* The understanding that consciousness is active, not passive.

What they added:

* Practice as the basis of cognition and the criterion of truth.
* Labor and production as the foundation of human existence and history.
* [[Class struggle]] as the motor of historical development.
* Revolutionary transformation as the goal of philosophy. <blockquote>The separation from Hegelian philosophy was here also the result of a return to the materialist standpoint. That means it was resolved to comprehend the real world — nature and history — just as it presents itself to everyone who approaches it free from preconceived idealist crotchets. It was decided mercilessly to sacrifice every idealist fancy which could not be brought into harmony with the facts conceived in their own and not in a fantastic interconnection. And materialism means nothing more than this. But here the materialistic world outlook was taken really seriously for the first time and was carried through consistently — at least in its basic features — in all domains of knowledge concerned. Hegel was not simply put aside. On the contrary, a start was made from his revolutionary side, described above, from the dialectical method. But in its Hegelian form, this method was unusable. According to Hegel, dialectics is the self-development of the concept. The absolute concept does not only exist — unknown where — from eternity, it is also the actual living soul of the whole existing world. It develops into itself through all the preliminary stages which are treated at length in the ''Logic'' and which are all included in it. Then it “alienates” itself by changing into nature, where, unconscious of itself, disguised as a natural necessity, it goes through a new development and finally returns as man’s consciousness of himself. This self-consciousness then elaborates itself again in history in the crude form until finally the absolute concept again comes to itself completely in the Hegelian philosophy. According to Hegel, therefore, the dialectical development apparent in nature and history — that is, the causal interconnection of the progressive movement from the lower to the higher, which asserts itself through all zigzag movements and temporary retrogression — is only a copy [Abklatsch] of the self-movement of the concept going on from eternity, no one knows where, but at all events independently of any thinking human brain. This ideological perversion had to be done away with. We again took a materialistic view of the thoughts in our heads, regarding them as images [Abbilder] of real things instead of regarding real things as images of this or that stage of the absolute concept. Thus dialectics reduced itself to the science of the general laws of motion, both of the external world and of human thought — two sets of laws which are identical in substance, but differ in their expression in so far as the human mind can apply them consciously, while in nature and also up to now for the most part in human history, these laws assert themselves unconsciously, in the form of external necessity, in the midst of an endless series of seeming accidents. Thereby the dialectic of concepts itself became merely the conscious reflex of the dialectical motion of the real world and thus the dialectic of Hegel was turned over; or rather, turned off its head, on which it was standing, and placed upon its feet. And this materialist dialectic, which for years has been our best working tool and our sharpest weapon, was, remarkably enough, discovered not only by us but also, independently of us and even of Hegel, by a German worker, Joseph Dietzgen. (2) In this way, however, the revolutionary side of Hegelian philosophy was again taken up and at the same time freed from the idealist trimmings which with Hegel had prevented its consistent execution. The great basic thought that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of readymade ''things'', but as a complex of ''processes'', in which the things apparently stable no less than their mind images in our heads, the concepts, go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away, in which, in spite of all seeming accidentally and of all temporary retrogression, a progressive development asserts itself in the end — this great fundamental thought has, especially since the time of Hegel, so thoroughly permeated ordinary consciousness that in this generality it is now scarcely ever contradicted. <ref>{{Web citation|author=Frederick Engels|newspaper=Marxists.org|title=Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy

Part 4: Marx|date=1886|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1886/ludwig-feuerbach/ch04.htm|quote=The separation from Hegelian philosophy was here also the result of a return to the materialist standpoint. That means it was resolved to comprehend the real world — nature and history — just as it presents itself to everyone who approaches it free from preconceived idealist crotchets. It was decided mercilessly to sacrifice every idealist fancy which could not be brought into harmony with the facts conceived in their own and not in a fantastic interconnection. And materialism means nothing more than this. But here the materialistic world outlook was taken really seriously for the first time and was carried through consistently — at least in its basic features — in all domains of knowledge concerned.

Hegel was not simply put aside. On the contrary, a start was made from his revolutionary side, described above, from the dialectical method. But in its Hegelian form, this method was unusable. According to Hegel, dialectics is the self-development of the concept. The absolute concept does not only exist — unknown where — from eternity, it is also the actual living soul of the whole existing world. It develops into itself through all the preliminary stages which are treated at length in the Logic and which are all included in it. Then it “alienates” itself by changing into nature, where, unconscious of itself, disguised as a natural necessity, it goes through a new development and finally returns as man’s consciousness of himself. This self-consciousness then elaborates itself again in history in the crude form until finally the absolute concept again comes to itself completely in the Hegelian philosophy. According to Hegel, therefore, the dialectical development apparent in nature and history — that is, the causal interconnection of the progressive movement from the lower to the higher, which asserts itself through all zigzag movements and temporary retrogression — is only a copy [Abklatsch] of the self-movement of the concept going on from eternity, no one knows where, but at all events independently of any thinking human brain. This ideological perversion had to be done away with. We again took a materialistic view of the thoughts in our heads, regarding them as images [Abbilder] of real things instead of regarding real things as images of this or that stage of the absolute concept. Thus dialectics reduced itself to the science of the general laws of motion, both of the external world and of human thought — two sets of laws which are identical in substance, but differ in their expression in so far as the human mind can apply them consciously, while in nature and also up to now for the most part in human history, these laws assert themselves unconsciously, in the form of external necessity, in the midst of an endless series of seeming accidents. Thereby the dialectic of concepts itself became merely the conscious reflex of the dialectical motion of the real world and thus the dialectic of Hegel was turned over; or rather, turned off its head, on which it was standing, and placed upon its feet. And this materialist dialectic, which for years has been our best working tool and our sharpest weapon, was, remarkably enough, discovered not only by us but also, independently of us and even of Hegel, by a German worker, Joseph Dietzgen. (2)

In this way, however, the revolutionary side of Hegelian philosophy was again taken up and at the same time freed from the idealist trimmings which with Hegel had prevented its consistent execution. The great basic thought that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of readymade things, but as a complex of processes, in which the things apparently stable no less than their mind images in our heads, the concepts, go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away, in which, in spite of all seeming accidentally and of all temporary retrogression, a progressive development asserts itself in the end — this great fundamental thought has, especially since the time of Hegel, so thoroughly permeated ordinary consciousness that in this generality it is now scarcely ever contradicted.}}</ref></blockquote>

== Historical significance ==
Despite his limitations, Feuerbach played a crucial transitional role:
- He demolished Hegelian idealism and restored materialism to philosophy.

- He provided Marx and Engels with the initial materialist framework they would develop into historical materialism.

- His critique of religion as alienation influenced Marx's theory of alienation under capitalism.

- He represents the highest point pre-Marxist materialism could reach before it required dialectics and revolutionary practice to advance further.

Feuerbach thus stands as both the culmination of one philosophical tradition (contemplative materialism) and the necessary stepping stone to another (dialectical and historical materialism). To understand Marx, one must understand both what Marx learned from Feuerbach and what Marx added that Feuerbach could not conceive.

== References ==
<references />