Rewards & Punishments
As neighbour to the oldest capitalist country on Earth, Ireland has long been subjected to tactics of the British Empire. Their present day successors - the neocolonial Irish state and its guard dogs - continue the system of rewards and punishments that ensure the continuance of capitalist domination. And an outright military occupation is maintained in the north, just in case.
This system is effective at both the highest levels of power and in the most modest assemblies. The ability to ensure that top decision makers are unapologetic Zionists, to ensure only compliant middle management get promoted, and to nip grassroots momentum in the bud - each is a crucial weapon in a comprehensive system to prevent dissent.
The system claims to reward merit, but in truth its priority is loyalty.
Channeling Dissent
No capitalist-imperialist system can rely on establishment powers alone. The human drive to decency and liberation from oppression cannot be safely neutered without channeling the dissent that does emerge into dead-ends.
Control of dissent is achieved by carving people into groups designed to focus on anything other than the workings of capitalism and class. The whole concept of supposed “Western Values” is to prevent a basic understanding of how capitalism INEVITABLY drives exploitation, colonialism and imperialism. Maintaining this ignorance - easily dispelled by reading say Lenin’s Imperialism - is the establishment’s Prime Directive.
A compatible left is platformed on one “side” to moralize impotently, while an opposing side is fueled via astroturfing of a counter position in some shallow culture war, constructed to deflect the crimes of the capitalist state by transferring them onto immigrants or some vague group such as globalists, corrupt officials or whoever.
The deceptive suggestion from both sides is that capitalism can be cleaned up, when in fact it is a fundamentally anti-human system.
The Cycle: well meaning activist to burnout
The empty rhetoric of the compatible left does draw in well-meaning people who want to oppose the system. It provides an apparent outlet while keeping people busy in a way that involves no theoretical education, no development and no threat to the system.
An immovable leadership opposes any democratic control, so the same rinse-and-repeat cycle produces nothing but burnt-out and tuned-out former activists. Along with an annoyed general public who see through the talk that is disconnected from their reality and from any progress.
Revolutionary Wreckers
The more poisonous tactic of a compatible “left” is that of gaining ground for capitalist-imperialist goals under a cloak of ultra revolutionary blather.
For an extreme but illustrative example from history, check out this excellent take-down of the propagandist and British agent George Orwell. His distortion of treachery by an anti-communist left in the Spanish Civil War is covered in Chapter 6, Land & Freedom, on p162 of this free PDF book from CPGML.
A more mundane, modern day betrayal can be seen in People Before Profit (PBP) running a candidate against a rare voice of dissent in the European Parliament. By ensuring Clare Daly wouldn’t get elected in 2024, PBP played their role in silencing dissent. Daly was informing the general public of facts that expose the lies of US led imperialism, such as the CIA backed 2014 coup in Ukraine that installed the Banderite fascists.
Although in this case PBP failed to even offer the cloak of revolutionary rhetoric around their vote splitting.
A common pattern is to throw out a vague smear while pretending to defend an identity group we are conditioned to see as victims, regardless of the scenario. Despite being used to death, it’s still an effective tactic as it steers the focus away from a specific issue onto an unrelated culture war. To be effective, the supposed victim in this false accusation should be associated with a group has indeed been victimized at some point. The fact that the association is incorrect in this case (since it’s a false accusation) is buried in the distraction of the culture war.
The most cliched example is to frame criticism of Zionism - a fascist, genocidal, colonial project - as antisemitism. Thankfully most people have seen through this bad faith attempt to transfer a history of persecution of Jews in Europe onto Palestinians who, unlike the Ukrainian Banderites, have no connection with the history of European fascism.
Another angle is to frame any dissent as an “attack” on the closest establishment spokesperson. Such snowflake levels of defense are not extended to those opposing the system of course. Civility is a one-sided requirement, reserved as a weapon only for defense of the capitalist-imperialist system.
The Cheap Slurs
The system that protects establishment platforms from non-compliant voices is usually efficient enough that dissenting voices can be quietly ignored, since there is little to no risk of them getting wide reach.
So when the establishment actually names a supposedly dissenting group out loud, however negatively, it’s usually a reliable indicator that said group is considered safely controlled opposition. Safe enough to give it exposure.
The system normally avoids giving exposure to any group that has a clear analysis of the enemy and the path forward. A few opportune smears may be needed to deter curious young minds so they can continue to be misled by compliant “opposition”. But not so public a mention as to draw in a new audience.
Cheap slurs limited to a select audience - this is an easy, lazy tactic to cast aspersions on any movement that lies outside the control of the capitalist status quo.
The Path Forward
There is a treasure trove of inspiring theory and practice to draw on while we look to connect, educate ourselves and organise.
The clarity provided by the realisation that our world is knowable in meaningful ways gives us the confidence to effectively shape it once more. However distant or difficult our goal to liberate the masses from oppression may now appear.
And real personal liberation is achieved on the way. Liberation from the lie that the miserable and limited world presented by capitalism, a world built on exploitation and deception, is a reflection of humanity in general. History, truth and resistance say otherwise. Together we wield these as weapons for change and a new world.