Polish-Jewish Relations: 1,300 Keyword-Phrase-Indexed Book Reviews (by Jan Peczkis)

Stalinist Confessions, by Igal Halfin. 2009. University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh

Mensheviks Bolsheviks: Communism Was Broad-Based, Not Just Consisting of the Bolsheviks

We sometimes hear the exculpation that there were more Jews involved among the Social Democrats and the Mensheviks than there were among the Bolsheviks. But no matter: The differences between these leftist political groupings were more apparent than real.

Halfin writes: “It was sometimes difficult to distinguish between a populist and a Social Democrat, a Bolshevik and a Menshevik, a Stalinist and a Trotskyist–after all, they professed the same revolutionary values, spoke the same Marxian language, adhered to the same emancipatory project.” (p. 3).

For more on the largely-semantic differences between the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks, see my review:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/jewish-disloyalty-1912-duma-elections-portnoy/

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/zydokomuna-exculpations-fail-mendelsohn/

For more on the fuzzy boundary between Jewish socialists and outright Jewish Communists, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/zydokomuna-socialist-communist-fuzzy-boundary-fishman/

Clearly, there are different strains of Zydokomuna, but they are part of the same Communist rootstock. These facts also contradict modern leftists who try to dichotomize “Trotskyites” and “Stalinists”, etc.

“WORKING CLASS” AND LEFTSPEAK

It is also interesting to note that, for all the Communist rhetoric about the “working class”, this was in actuality an ideological/propaganda construct. Halfin comments: “The Communist party was the party of the proletariat, but proletarian was a way of thinking, not a station in life to which one was born. Every individual who assumed the proletarian perspective could become a member of the Party (and, inversely, workers with bruises on their hands were barred entrance if their consciousness was not ripe).” (p. 372).

FASCIST!

Since time immemorial, Communists have labeled those who disagreed with them as fascists and Nazis. Interestingly, Soviet cartoons went as far as calling Trotsky a fascist and Nazi supporter. (p. 347). Now the cultural Marxists have picked up the cue, and do the same.