To Chris Burford!

Now I want to go into the first parts of your document of Dec, 3,
1998. Since then, some time has passed, but in the meantime anyway
we have published other postings which at the same time were
statements on several contributions of yours, the internet statements
11/98 and 12/98 containing the articles resp. remarks by Eduard
Bernstein and Friedrich Engels. Also a quite essential point has already
been dealt with by the member of our editoral staff, W. Grobe.
I shall not go into assertions and insinuations which remain without
proof, but only into concrete questions as well as questions which
concretely ensue from the text.

>>In the way it is presently being
>>propagated, by the capital groups ruling in the world,
>>especially by the international financial oligarchy, it
>>furthermore becomes a means in the service of their aim to
>>weaken the social structure, to degenerate the population,
>>sometimes even to diminish the population by number, and to
>>culturally weaken the labor movement and the masses of people
>>who in many countries are no more ready to accept the present
>>condition.

>Why would finance capitalism want the population to be reduced?
>Less labourpower, less surplus value?

This counterquestion is based on a naive calculation. Have you ever
heard of Malthusianism and the extensive critiques Marx and Engels wrote
about it?
The bourgeoisie's attitude towards the development of the productive
forces and the development of the masses of the people is completely
contradictory. They are forced to develop the productive forces, and at
the same time they are in fear of this development, which leads to the
corresponding counterreactions. Furthermore, now the diminution of
the population does not mean for the time being a diminution of profits
for certain parts of the bourgeoisie. If they succeed in slowing down
the revolutionary development they also will be able to increase the
pressure to accept the sale of labor at very bad conditions. Taking the
example of Europe we are able to analyze such developments in
practice. Has the partly extremely low birth rate, the diminution of the
indigenous population lead to a diminution of profits? Of course not.
Partly the bourgeoisie still has a sufficient number of people at its
disposition who are in their years when they are able to work; on the
other hand competition among workers is intensified by the the influx
of new workers from abroad. Today the bourgeoisie is offering jobs to
a considerable part of the indigenous as well as of the foreign and the
nationalized population, the conditions of which 20 years ago one
wouldn't have dared even to talk about. The actual question is: under
which conditions is labour offerred, and how is the capitalist reserve
army brought into play? The simple inference: "less labour, less surplus
value" reveals bare economism.
You could as well put the following question on occasion of a war: a
war means destruction of men and productive facilities, so it equally
would be a case of 'less labour, less surplus value'. But you know very
well that for certain kinds of capitalists these big war destructions do
not mean any reduction of profits but just the opposite.

>>Some of the main points we want to sum up here.
>>
>>
>>During the period of 1895, when Engels fell heavily ill and
>>finally died in August, the so-called successors Eduard
>>Bernstein and Karl Kautsky got down to massively trample all
>>over the labor movement principles as represented by him and
>>Marx, and to push forward a complete revision of their views.
>>Especially openly this happened with Bernstein. It attracts
>>attention that those two, in a base manner, against the
>>author's will, falsified, among others, the preface to the
>>then very vell-known work about the class struggles in France.
>>Engels complained in a letter that his preface had been
>>"trimmed in such a way that I look like a peaceful worshipper
>>of legality quand mme" . (MEW, vol. 39, p. 452) Shortly after
>>this clash Engels all of a sudden fell so heavily ill that the
>>possibilities to continue his work were virtually taken away
>>from him.

>Is it not the case that Engels chose Bernstein as his literary executor?
 

Yes, but when did he do so? This was in 1893. In fact, Bernstein had
been occupying an important role for Engels, based on his versatility as
an intellectual editor. Engels had however always kept certain
reservations. These were drastically intensified during 1893, 1894 and
1895. During the aforementioned time of spring, 1895, Engels
occasionally gave very negative judgements about Bernstein. As this is
a subject of general interest, we shall sum up these statements by
Engels on Bernstein and Kautsky in a separate place. During the last
weeks of his life Engels retired, together with his closer relatives, the
people belonging immediately to his household and some very old
comrades in arms. What, besides, was he able to do else about the
question of his literary legacy? He only could entrust it to somebody
who had an overview over the fields which had been dealt with during
several decades. Besides he was not able to see the full extent of
Bernstein's villainess.

>>Exactly in the beginning
>>of May, 1895, when Engels was already badly weakened, Eduard
>>Bernstein attacked the labor movement that it allegedly
>>cultivated an "almost pharisaical ultra-puritanical moralism"
>>with regard to homosexuality, and started defending the writer
>>Oscar Wilde who because of pederasty stood trial, together
>>with a homosexuals' pimp.

>Surely there could have been progressive reasons for opposing the
>jailing of Wilde for his sexual choice in the hypocritical climate of
>later 19th century imperial Britain.
 

There could have been progressive reasons? Which reasons? You are
only speculating. Beyond this, it is not only about sexual choices but
about the whole of Oscar Wilde's conduct. There are pederasty and a
milieu of homosexual pimping being mentioned.

>Interesting. Engels had a degree of respect for William Morris, who
>was an anti-industrialist.
 

William Morris is a representative of the English labor movement who
had come from anarchism and anti-industrial ideas and gradually had
approached the positions of the party of the working class. If Engels
furthered his development this does not mean that he accepted Morris'
wrong positions. Nowhere Friedrich Engels furthered anti-industrial
views. We regret to certify you that you desperately want to read a
support out of something, which doesn't exist at all. But if we, as it
was the case in Internet Statement #12/98, give you the quotations by
Engels about homosexuality, you declare that minor matters. It is
impossible to proceed like that.

Now we arrive at a very fundamental point which you stir up by
mentioning the Communist Manifesto. Here it really comes to the
point.
Our colleague W. Grobe already went into it. But the matter is so
central that I want to do it again.

>I would have thought that marxism would take a more general view:
>"All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is
>at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life,
>and his relations with his kind." (Manifesto)

>I would have thought the overview is the link between homosexuality
>and the atomised individualism that is the counterpart of the triumph
>of atomised commodity production. If people come together out of
>pure naked self interest, as individuals, they may just as logically do
>so in homosexual as in heterosexual encounters. It has become the
>benchmark of thoroughgoing bourgeois democratic civil society. It
>has become important that the armed forces should admit gays, and
>also the churches. This symbolises the triumph of the idea of global
>civil society of atomised individuals. There are many complex
>contradictions in that process, but I do not see why marxists should
>call it degeneracy.
 

Nowhere Marx says that, for example, the profanation of the holy
means the alteration of the basic substance of human sexuality.
Certainly, love is not exempt from being shaped by society, by the
social classes. But the natural act of love, of sexual community, is
constant over millions of years. It does not change, the social
conditions change. It is a curiosity to question this. Human sexuality
which is not only immediately necessary for procreation but also has
been so extraordinarily important for the cultural development, is
registered under "the holy" by you. Such thoughts, anyway, are not to
be found in Marx and Engels. (Tranlator's note, see below)
And in the last passage you even more see love in the contradiction to
the sober, rational view of society.
Absurd as it is, your standpoint signifies a certain mechanistic
misinterpretation which is characterstic for a certain current.

This para perhaps is the most cynical and, in a certain way, most
striking one of the whole polemics which has taken place in the
Internet on the question, comprising up to now hundreds of
contributions. It marks a lot of discrepancies but is interesting, though.
There has never existed something like the idea of the global civilized
society of the atomized individuals is supposing, and it will never exist.
This idea marks wishful thinking from the part of capital. No society
can live without social structures, and it is good like that. 'No nations,
no organized classes' - this would fit into the wishes of capital, of the
most radical capital which carries on the most reckless destructive use
of labor. The "atomized individuals" are without rights in the struggle
with the highly organized capital.

Here, in my opinion, also the perversion of the author's views of
"bourgeois democratic society" is finding expression, because they
contain the tendency to call this society as outlined by him, if not the
final goal of humanity, an essential intermediate goal, anyway. Even if
this society would only in part become reality, it would paralyze
humanity, provided its ability to last at all.

These lines, disgusting as they are, one has to figure out in detail and
precision. Apart from a misanthropic philosophy they also contain
intentions of these circles of capital who support such a conception.
Wrong as they are, each of these sentences, taken separately, contains
a characteristic statement. Therefore they should be discussed more
broadly. Praisworthy the frankness, as it shows the cynism of the
liberators of homosexuality against society, above all against the
working classes.

>It has become important that the armed forces should admit gays, and
>also the churches. This symbolises the triumph of the idea of global
>civil society of atomised individuals. There are many complex
>contradictions in that process, but I do not see why marxists should
>call it degeneracy.

No degeneracy? In my opinion this is a degeneration of the bourgeois
democratic views which here are carried on unto absurdity. The former
bourgeois democratic revolution wanted to create conditions in which
men are able to better organize themselves on their own free will,
proceeding from which they are able to carry on their emancipation. As
the continuation of these ideas there rose essential new impulses for the
ideas of the right to strike, of freedom of forming coalitions, and all the
ideas which aim at man's emancipation and prepared the ideas of
socialism.
What hereof, however, has remained in the idea of the atomized
individuals? This idea has the aim to complete the deprivation of rights.
It is the opposite.
 

Translator's note:
[Here I want to make a short remark on your way of using quotations.
There is also a translation problem in the passage you quote.
1. The statement quoted by you "all that is holy is profaned" in this
place in the Manifesto is one of the summarizing expressions for the
destruction of all of the medieval-feudal social and cultural relations,
and in general of all earlier relations, by the bourgeoisie. The whole
section of the Manifesto starts as follows:
"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..."
And then follow many examples for these revolutions.
This unequivocally refers to social and cultural factors from the Middle
Ages etc.

2. If we suppose that you had only the short passage from the
Manifesto at hand which you quote then you have a problem caused by
the English translation you use. The passage is quite different in the
German original:
"Alles Ständische und Stehende verdampft, alles Heilige wird
entweiht..." (MEW 4, p. 465)
The English translation at this place in our opinion is quite insufficient,
if not misleading:
"All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned"
This does not contain exactly those expressions by which the medieval-
feudal, the stagnation of former societies is described. "Alles
Ständische" has to be translated roughly by "all that pertains to the
feudal estates". "Stehend" largely corresponds to "stagnating".
"Solid" - the expression used by the English translation by Progress
Publishers, Moscow - to us seems to be really a wrong expression
which misrepresents the sense of the single sentence in question. On
the other hand, the sense of the whole section remains clear, and if
you'd read more than the single sentence, also this sentence could not
have been misunderstood by you, as its sense unequivocally emerges
from the context.]
 

Editorial staff of NEUE EINHEIT
Hartmut Dicke
(with the assistance of the translator, W. Grobe)

Jan./Feb. 1999