The Point

Last updated: 27 June 2022.

We Can Win Socialist Arguments Without the Embarrassing Rhetoric

The other day I attended an SSP public meeting in which one of the audience members posed a question. As I listened, the length of the question grew. It then grew some more. This question continued to grow to the point that it became apparent that it was descending into a wee bit of a rant.

At this point, the volume slowly began to rise, the blood started pumping, and the passion displayed in this emotional monologue catapulted what originally began as a simple question into the stratospheric heights of a full blown cutting edge speech on the dire need for Socialist revolution, complete with a complimentary supply of Socialist rhetoric and terminology thrown in for good measure.

I still consider myself to be a bit of a novice when it comes to understanding and expressing what Socialism is, and more importantly, the kind of positive impact that it has the potential to have upon the majority of people's lives when actually implemented. Given the history of Socialism, the way in which it has had its name dragged through the mud in recent decades, especially in the post-Soviet era, it's no surprise that people often see it as tainted or as being dead.

It would be easy for me to go into detail about the failings of this, that or the next so called socialist or communist state. The problem with that is that it won't achieve anything productive in terms of aiding the battle out there on the streets.

As I listened to this person go on about what the Proletariat should be doing to protect ourselves against the Bourgeoisie, and they certainly made sure to employ the full catalogue of Socialist jargon during this process, what I found myself thinking was that if they were to be standing on the streets of Glasgow or Edinburgh on a busy Saturday afternoon, the people walking past this person would either dismiss them as a loony, or run away from them in sheer terror!

As someone who spends a fair amount of his spare time reading the likes of Lenin and Trotsky, I understand the arguments that this person talked about. I empathised with how they felt, with the sense of despair in feeling that you know how to change the world, that you know how to make it a better place, and yet despite this, all too often you find that no one cares much for what you think.

The problem which we on the Left have is that all too often we over complicate things. Quite frankly, the way I'm writing just now makes me just as complicit and guilty as anybody else in this matter. All too often, we on the left have a tendency to concentrate on trying to come across as intellectuals when all this achieves is that we alienate the very people with which we are trying to connect!

The majority of people which we will encounter on the streets of Scotland, whether through the anti-socialist propaganda that people naturally experience as part of growing up and living in a capitalist society, or simply through a lack of understanding or interest in what Socialism is and how it affects them, will be turned off by the over complicated rhetoric that we often employ.

It's not that we should attempt to "dumb down" our arguments so much as that we should be trying to make these arguments relevant to the day to day struggles of the working person. We must appeal to the working classes, especially those elements of the working class that don't have the time or patience to sit through tedious lectures on the intricacies of Marxism. We need to avoid using terminology such as Bourgeois and Proletariat as it distorts our message.

If we keep the message simple, what we'll find is that, on its own, our argument is strong enough to resonate with the majority of the people that we're appealing to. We don't have to dust off all the outdated rhetoric that the generations which came before us used because it is just that, outdated rhetoric.

We can be as technically correct and clever as we like in advocating for the Socialist Revolution but it won't bring us any closer to achieving our goals if the people that we need to help us build the country that we all deserve don't have the slightest clue about what we're going on about!

I know now that what I should have said to this person at the meeting is this, calm down. Keep it simple. You and I are on the same side here so let's make sure that when we're out there, when we're fighting the good fight together, that we don't forget what matters most in this ongoing struggle of ours.

We must never forget that without the working classes at our backs, we're powerless.

This article was taken from Scottish Left Projects Viewpoints section: http://leftproject.scot/2015/win-socialist-arguments-without-rhetoric/