Essay:Dogmatism, An Anti-Marxist Tendency

Note: This essay is a work in progress. Also, this isn't my first time writing an essay. I may bring my older essays into prolewiki (mostly critiques of ideologies in the American Ba'athist Server before the patsoc takeover)

Every Marxist-Leninist is aware of Dogma at this point, and the consensus is that dogma has no place in Marxist theory. Let us analyse closer as to why that is. Dogmatism is this word, mostly used in the context of insulting others, who accuse them of being as such. But what is Dogma? And why should we oppose it? Also a bigger question to pose is, do Marxist-Leninists have a tendency to go towards Dogma, and are they aware of when it happens?

Dogma in its essence

Dogma may be described liberally as "characterized by or given to the expression of opinions very strongly or positively as if they were facts", but this doesn't fully describe Dogma in its full nature. Sure people may view that some opinions are 'facts', but this definition is lost amongst Marxists as a result of using it, as we can describe that no one within Marxism (apart from a few,) are dogmatic. Dogmatism must be carefully understood, and a simple liberal definition will not outline the conditions of Dogma, and the premises of Dogma.

Dogma Historically

Dogma has been around for long before there was a conception of science to begin with, as the humans had to adapt within nature in some form. This form can be best described into having beliefs, but not yet a religion. They view the nature as something of mysticism, that humans wouldn't be able to grasp its foundations. As a result, Dogma was introduced. This is was the first premise of humans to form some form of logic of what is happening around. This dogma may come from a product of the mind, or the analysis of material conditions. Nonetheless, Dogma was the most common form of reason for many people (and even is to this day albeit less so). During the current mode of production (primitive communism), the product of Dogma is more or less from the product of the mind, and people believe in it as an explanation of nature as a whole. As primitive communism began to regress, as the productive forces were developing in a primitive way, people are beginning to collect their thoughts in order to make sense of the world. The premise built on, eventually collecting into the concept of a 'spiritual being' or multiple of them, which is a 'God' or multiple 'Gods'. This is the creation of Theism and Religion.

There was split between dogmas, but all of them were collected into bigger clusters of religions. The religions antagonised each other, as they fought barbarically, and cannot stray from the foundation of their dogma. The original premise still remains and the religions were founded upon more than two different premises. These premises were in contradiction, antagonistic with each other, and one needed to be superior to another. The productive forces let it develop more weapons, in order to carry out wars and battles. Materialism may not have been conceived fully until the ancient greeks. The Greeks had a long standing battle in philosophy, a philosophy (which still continues to this day) between Materialism and Idealism. There may have been people who conceived of the material conditions or nature, and thus utilised it to a better capacity than the idealists, but the Greeks viewpoint of Materialism was first negation of the idealist philosophy.

The productive forces which are developed, the relations to the means of production changing, however, the negation of idealism has been impacted on the productive forces, as they seem to increase as a rate faster than the mode of production preceding it. This is in result to the view that people perceive, that the people increasingly analyse nature, and are able to develop products such as Swords instead of Spears, Castles with stone rather than Huts with wood. Despite this, Dogma was still dominant, as the Dictatorship of the Aristocracy had been taken over. The productive forces were more subservient to the aristocracy rather than the peasants or serfs who produced the means of production.

In modern times, materialism (however in the metaphysical sense) had replaced Dogma. Dogma was mostly a product of Idealism, and those who followed Idealism were mostly ridiculed with the exception of those who believe in religion. Religion is still prominent, albeit not much so in the Western world.

Describing Dogma

Dogma is not just viewing statements as fact regardless of materialist analysis. It is rather a combination of the previous statement and another. That other is that of "false premises". The dogma that is proposed has a premise, that premise being what ever the person desires. That desire may be a product of the mind or it may come from material conditions. Regardless, if the foundation is material but the way in the person speak it is dogmatic (e.g. argument from authority or argument from popularity), it is a false premise. The original foundation is disconnected from the premise brought on by the person. An example may be arguing about evolution. If a person is arguing about how people evolved, and they do not bring up any evidence to show it is the case, but rather argue from an Authority, it is a false premise. The foundation (Evolution) is scientific, but the person has essentially disconnected themselves from evidence, and instead relies on authority figures as a sort of 'shield' to protect their ideas. Of course we do not analyse every specific detail, we do not need to analyse how the atoms bond together to form molecules, and those molecules form amino acids, and therefore proteins, etc etc. There is no need for unnecessary detail, because it completely deviates from the point originally stated. But rather, we show evidence that correlates with this theory (such as primates having human features), and as such that is applying materialism. As a result of this, dogmatic people have a tendency to remain ignorant about the material conditions, they just say their statement then no further analysis proceeds, there is no analysis of material conditions. Whilst the statement may be true, their source of evidence is null, despite claiming to be 'materialistic'. As such, the people who have dogmatic beliefs (even if they claim otherwise), are idealist.

Dogma may also describe someone following as what I'd like to describe as 'purity fetishism', that is, striving for purity. This 'purity' does not always mean striving for the full substance of it, and leaving any deviations aside, as in having 100% socialism for example (which is a stupid phrase to begin with), but rather something which only denies slight deviations, anomalies. It would be only considered a 'necessary evil' of sorts in order to achieve a goal. For example, having 90% 'socialism' is tolerable, whilst 50% socialism is not. Of course these fetishists accept some other forms of deviation (such as the NEP), but become hypocritical eventually as their sense of purity becomes more paramount.

As such, we can describe Dogma with these characteristics:

1. Regarding statements as 'fact' without evidence
2. Utilising a false premise in order to justify their statement
3. (Typically but not always) striving for purity fetishism.

Dogma in the context of Marxism

Should Marxists oppose Dogmatism? Most certainly. Dogmatism is not only a regression towards Marxism, but it impacts the scientific background of Marxism as a whole. Dogmatism is inherently antagonistic to the 'Scientific Socialism' discovered by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. An example is in the preface to the 1872 German Edition of the Communist Manifesto, where Engels states that some parts need to be improved:

However much that state of things may have altered during the last twenty-five years, the general principles laid down in the Manifesto are, on the whole, as correct today as ever. Here and there, some detail might be improved. The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today.

So as we can see here, Marxists should be aware of dogmatism and oppose it as well. However, as Mao stated "Idealism and metaphysics are the easiest things in the world", there will be Marxists who have a tendency to fall into dogma, as what Mao at the time called "Book Worship". Mao ruthlessly criticised those who fell into this trap, a trap which still plagues Marxist-Leninists to this day:

When we say that a directive of a higher organ of leadership is correct, that is not just because it comes from "a higher organ of leadership" but because its contents conform with both the objective and subjective circumstances of the struggle and meet its requirements. It is quite wrong to take a formalistic attitude and blindly carry out directives without discussing and examining them in the light of actual conditions simply because they come from a higher organ.

It is not because we think a decision is right because a book says it, we think it is right because it directly applies to the material conditions. The material conditions demand something that cannot be just simply traced from characteristics posed by an author (however significant that author may be). There is a need for books, and there is a need for education, but there is no need for dogmatism within Marxism. Just because it is stated, does not automatically mean it's fact. However, regardless of the material conditions, those who are part of a position of higher power, and those who apply what ever is desired, despite from suffering the fate of alienating yourself from the masses. Let us examine the praxis of those marxists who clearly utilised dogmatism.

Khrushchevite Dogmatism

After the death of Stalin, Khrushchev rose to power. I will not debate over whether the Soviet Union was socialist post-Stalin, as it is irrelevant to this discussion. Khrushchev may presented as an opportunist especially in the context of the 'Anti-revisionists' (whom I will get onto later), however, his opportunism doesn't overshadow the amount of dogmatism presented within the Khrushchev era of the Soviet Union. His analysis of the material conditions was flawed. Unlike Stalin with his five years plans, analysing the material conditions and allowing the nation to industrialise properly with the help of the peasantry, Khrushchev