WOW! Portland State University Offers Revolutionary MARXISM Course! Check Out the Syllabus!!! (deaths, party)

[hamellr]

Originally Posted by OICU812

Will they offer other courses in genocide and forced labor camp management?

Right after the critical thinking class, and the "learning about the subject before speaking out your backside," class.

[Mircea]

Originally Posted by doctrain

"Portland State University is offering a number of controversial courses this semester, the likes of which include “Revolutionary Marxism: Theory and Practice,“ and ”Art Within Activism”..."

"The course’s instructors, Grant Booth and Wael Elasady, are both admitted socialists. They define the course’s goals as:

1. Students will learn the fundamentals of Marxist theory
2. Students will apply a Marxist analysis to current events
3. Students will apply Marxist theory to local political and community organizing
Moreover, students will seemingly be required to forge a “community connection” with a local community/political organization from a specified list. Some of the “approved” organizations include: Occupy PSU, Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights, Occupy Portland, Portland Boycott-Divestment-Sanctions Coalition (BDS), Jobs with Justice, and the May Day Coalition."

Portland State University Offering ‘Revolutionary Marxism,’ Course Where Students Work with Occupy Wall Street | TheBlaze.com

Why are our tax dollars paying for this???

Why shouldn't they pay for it? "The Blaze" is one of the least credible sources of information.

Surely you could have gone to the university's web-site and linked to the course.

Originally Posted by doctrain

Sigh...I love how some refuse to read the links or refuse to acknowledge the devil in the details; i.e., how this course involves ACTIVISM - not simply learning about MARXISM.

"This course is designed to introduce students to the basic concepts of Marxist thought with an emphasis on the practical applications of Marxist Theory in local political struggle."

Yeah, so? What's wrong with that? I always encouraged my students to get actively involved and I myself got actively involved, like doing legal research and presenting papers at symposiums to free the illegally held Guantanamo detainees.

Originally Posted by doctrain

Yeah. After they have helped promote it.

"This course is designed to introduce students to the basic concepts of Marxist thought with an emphasis on the practical applications of Marxist Theory in local political struggle."

"The course’s instructors, Grant Booth and Wael Elasady, are both admitted socialists. They define the course’s goals as:"

1. Students will learn the fundamentals of Marxist theory
2. Students will apply a Marxist analysis to current events
3. Students will apply Marxist theory to local political and community organizing

(emphasis added)

Again, what's wrong with that?

I'd rather have people involved in activism instead of couch-potato-ism.

You might want to pause just long enough to consider that if you never get involved, then nothing ever happens.

Originally Posted by doctrain

Get real. They are not just learning about Marxism so they can appreciate the benefits of Capitalism. The professors are self identified Socialists. The students will be actively applying what they learn in the Community as they are hooked up with groups like Occupy. Read the article.

Progressive/Socialist Professors all over the country are busy instructing our youth on how to abolish Capitalism through whatever means are necessary. Here is another example:

Great, another example from the "The Blaze" (snicker).

I hear so many on this forum whining and crying like a bunch of sissies about neo-conservatives, about neo-liberal institutionalists and about classical conservatives, so why in the hell wouldn't you want people to learn about Marxism?

How can you possibly understand Radical Theory if you don't understand Marxism, since Radical Theory is based on Marxism?

And if you don't understand Marxism or Radical Theory, then how in the world can you possibly understand Constructivism?

And, by the way, just what exactly were those in international relations who, like me, are Constructivists saying about Iraq and Afghanistan?

We all said the US would lose. And stated quite clearly the exact reasons why.

And how did Iraq and Afghanistan work out for everyone?

If you had more Radicals and Constructivists in your government running your foreign policy instead of having it loaded with mostly neo-conservatives and a lot of neo-liberal institutionalits, you might actually win a war fought for just and proper reasons now and again.

Controversially...

Mircea

Originally Posted by juppiter

I don't think one needs to be Marxist to find this kind of a course interesting or important. In fact, I would think a staunch anti-Marxist would want to take this in order to understand how to avoid Marxism at all costs.

They don't get it, but why would you want to avoid Marxism?

Questioning...

Mircea

Originally Posted by Little-Acorn

The fact that it doesn't work, has never worked, and its only real result is to oppress and destroy nations... but people keep trying it anyway?

Um, you left out the part about Marxism has never been tried.

If you don't try something, you can never know if it works or not.

What part of the Marxist view of history is wrong?

None.

What did Marx say was the purpose of government?

Government is merely a platform controlled by the bourgeoisie to protect the interests of the bourgeoisie.

That's happening right now, just as Marx said it would.

Your politicians didn't draft Obamacare, rather it was the American Hospital Association and the health plan providers (and the IRS).

Your big corporations write the legislation that drives competitors out of business, using employing regulatory tactics.

You know, if you read and understood Marx, your eyes might actually open and you might see what is going on cloaked in the Mantra of Capitalism.

I take it you've never written Two Cheers for Capitalism and the Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism, written by Kristol and Bell respectively (two iconic gurus of neo-conservatism).

Well you might want to bury your nose in those books and take a few courses in radical Marxism before you end up being a serf or peon in the the new Feudal-Capitalistic State.

What else did Marx say? He said Capitalism would expand until it filled the world. It probably will. It won't be too long before the mayor of New York City is McDonald's and you'll be emailing "Congresscorps" Westinghouse, Disney, GE and General Motors, and calling Senators Proctor & Gamble, Honeywell, General Dynamics and Boeing on your cell-phone while driving to your State capital to see Governor Comcast.

Amused...

Mircea

Originally Posted by DRob4JC

Capitalism actually teaches a person how to produce, start a business, support oneself, etc

Yeah? Well it doesn't seem to be working given the fact that you are all totally dependent on corporations to provide you with jobs (and health care benefits); and given that you have the unmitigated gall to criticize a corporation for not hiring or for laying off workers when you know or should know damn good and well that the sole purpose of a corporation is to make profits for share-holders and that when a corporation hires employees at all, it is by nature whimsical as the employees are only incidental to the sole function of a corporation (which is to make money for share-holders and not to employee people).

Teaching....

Mircea

Originally Posted by GregW

IIRC Mr. Marx was proposing a means of saving Capitalism from the monopoly businesses of his time.

Uh, I don't know, I'll have to think about that for a while. Capitalism initially was just an extension of Feudalism, and while it did loosen up a bit, Capitalism has been shifting back toward Feudal Capitalism in the US for some time now (especially since the end of WW II).

Originally Posted by GregW

Shifting his theory into a totalitarian communism was the work of Lenin and Stalin.

Yes, it was, and each, Leninism and Stalin-ism was merely cloaked in the Mantra of Marxism, but in practice nothing even remotely close to Marxism.

Concurring...

Mircea

[gwynedd1]

1) The abolition of the property/ownership of land.

Addresses a big problem under feudalism with a small group of privileged landed gentry. Not so radical. Certainly flawed due to "tragedy of the commons". Bad solution. Land taxes are the solution.

2) Income tax to be graded to income – the more an individual earned, the more they paid. The less you earned, the less you paid.

Lots of people have no problem with progressive taxation.

3) Abolition of all rights of inheritance.

Not a conservative favorite. Still inheritances do reek of hereditary landed nobility. Again the land value tax addresses it much better. It joins ownership and social use. Pay for the military that protects it.

4) The confiscation of all property of immigrants and rebels.

I wonder if conservatives would really object?

5) The centralisation of all credit into the hands of the state by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive economy.

This sure beats handing it over to the banking cartel. Wish we had a Marxist banking system rather than the "independent" Fed.

6) Centralisation of all means of communication and transport into the hands of the state.

Some , not all. National highway system seemed to work out well. Still broken here because transportation projects change land values which are not properly collected. Its a lottery win paid by the rest of us. A project could create a 100 million in wealth to land owners at the cost of 90 million and still be considered a dead weight expense.


And Karl, didn't you see how popular this "benefit" might be for say dictators?

7) The extension of factories and the instrument of production owned by the state. Bringing into cultivation all land not being used that could be and an improvement in the fertility of the soil.

Not this time Karl. Bad idea.

8) The equal obligation of all to work and the establishment of an industrial and agricultural armies.

So where are the liberals on this? Not even Karl Marx was for welfare. Sound like a conservative to me.

9) The combination of agriculture and manufacturing industries with the gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country by the more equable distribution of the population over the country.

Yes factory farms and antiquated zoning laws...

10) Free education for all children in public schools. The abolition of child labour in factories; an educated child would be better for society in the long term, than a child not educated.

Aren't we all Marxists here?

So again going from the 19th century to know we have turned into a socialist state in man y areas. However many of the bad ideas were not adopted while we adopted one really bad idea he never advocated and that is welfare for no work.

[robbobobbo]

Originally Posted by OICU812

Will they offer other courses in genocide and forced labor camp management?

That's offered in many history classes, including American.

[helenejen]

If there is a market for the class, who the heck are you people to say that this University shouldn't offer the class? If a student wants to spend her tuition dollars on this class, then you the heck are you to say that she shouldn't be able? If there is no market for the class, the class will be cancelled. Simple as that. Capitalism 101!!!

[cwa1984]

Originally Posted by hammertime33

What's the issue here?

The fact you even ask that is troubling.

[db108108]

Originally Posted by DRob4JC

Capitalism actually teaches a person how to produce, start a business, support oneself, etc.

Marxism teaches community organizing, protesting, and white collar thuggery. Doesn't help the country at all.

We need productive people not a bunch of rabble rousers.

You really have no idea what you're talking about.

Das Kapital is the main work which would lay out what Marxism is, as an economic theory. That's all it is. It's not something entirely in opposition to capitalism - it describes the the history of capitalism through the lens of class. It's hard not to agree with/see its points.

The Communist Manifesto is different - it is a call to political action.

Two entirely different books. Most Americans don't know that, however, because they're been taught to see a book like Das Kapital as inherently evil.

So, you would be okay with a public university offering a course in Nazism taught by a self proclaimed Neo-Nazi who requires the students to not only learn about Nazism but also actively apply what they have learned in the class at Neo-Nazi Community Organizations?

You're really not getting it. Karl Marx did not implement the idea of communism anywhere because he died in the 19th Century. How people like Stalin, etc. interpreted his ideas/books can't really be laid on him. Nazism, on the other hand, was never a "political/economic" theory. It was a bunch of thugs who made the rules up as they went, and adjusted them to suit whatever agenda they held. They're just not comparable in any way, shape or form.

Now, if you would like to compare Stalinism to Nazism, then you'd have a point.

[cwa1984]

Originally Posted by juppiter

I don't think one needs to be Marxist to find this kind of a course interesting or important. In fact, I would think a staunch anti-Marxist would want to take this in order to understand how to avoid Marxism at all costs.

Hardly. It will be the professor no doubt bitching constantly about the "evils of the world" and promoting an ideological system that has killed more people then other just like a typical hypocrite which marxists are.

Think of it this way, we do not want our kids to be Nazis, but we still think teaching them about WWII is important. Why is this any different?

Maybe because the course deals with the "practical application of Marxism" perhaps?


This course just further proves the point that progressives are closet marxists.

[twinArmageddons]

Originally Posted by cwa1984

The fact you even ask that is troubling.

Why?

What harm is there in learning a way of doing things that's pretty much never been implemented before?

[robbobobbo]

Originally Posted by cwa1984

The fact you even ask that is troubling.

Don't be shy. Explain.