/leftypol/ - Leftist Politically Incorrect

Isn't the point of the left to not be secret but to be popular? Hiding is kinda cowardly, no?

>>492998
Tbh the left is way too reliant on popularity.

Even so, I think the real reason that secret societies tend to be more likely to be right wing is that secret societies tend to really be little clubs where people with large amounts of wealth or state funding get together to conspire on how to use their assets to attain certain goals. When people who aren't rich or politically powerful, and who don't have a deep attachment to existing power structures, do something like this it's usually referred to as a "gang" or a "cell" or something, rather than a secret society.

The first "exception" which comes to mind (which may not be a real exception, my memory is murky on whether they were meaningfully left wing beyond opposing the Nazi occupation of France and opposing Nazi anti-Jewish bigotry) is Bataille's Acéphale. Per Wiki:
"Bataille referred several times to Marcel Mauss who had studied secret societies in Africa, describing them as a "total social phenomenon". On this model, he organized several nocturnal meetings in the woods, near an oak which had been struck by lightning. Members of the Acéphale society were required to adopt several rituals, such as refusing to shake hands with antisemites and celebrating the decapitation of Louis XVI, an event which prefigured the "chiefless crowd" targeted by "acéphalité". Members of the society were also invited to meditation, on texts of Nietzsche, Freud, Sade and Mauss read during the assemblies. To psychologically prepare for the violence and losses that active duty in the French Resistance to Vichy–Nazi occupation of France would bring, members discussed carrying out a human sacrifice, but this was never carried out."

Anyway, as a structure, there's nothing wrong with the left utilizing "secret societies." The idea that we have to do everything in the daylight because popularity or something is just a really, really bad idea. No successful revolution has occurred, to my knowledge, without clandestine activities being carried out.

Usually the only left-ish secret societies are for terrorist activities. Weather Underground, Symbionese Liberation Army, etc. The problem is when you go underground you cut yourself off from growth and public sympathy. It's impossible to win a revolution without public sympathy.

>>493003
>The problem is when you go underground you cut yourself off from growth and public sympathy. It's impossible to win a revolution without public sympathy.
No to the first, qualified no to the second.

It isn't actually impossible to have public sympathy while operating underground, and revolutionaries have to operate underground unless they already have established military support… in which case, they still need to have some cover for their revolutionary activities as long as they operate separately from sympathizers within the armed forces. Anyway, it's really the state propaganda machine and crackdowns which make garnering sympathy difficult.

Some level of public sympathy is necessary to win a revolution, but it's also true that public sympathy can be gained through the course of revolution, and it's not necessary to start with overwhelming public sympathy or even have overwhelming public sympathy at the time of victory. The primary concerns are taking control over the state through force; the most valuable sympathy to have in this case isn't the general public, it's swathes of the lower ranks of the military class, and whatever sympathizers can be gained from the upper ranks. More sympathy is good, but trying to set out on revolution starting with overwhelming support, delaying and delaying in the hopes of some day getting that starting point without first accomplishing anything, is a fool's errand. It's important to look at this stuff for what it is; a socialist revolution represents the interests of the working class, but it still must attain power through ruthless revolutionary warfare which only requires enough support and power to overtake the existing state and take control of, and reform, and run the existing bureaucracies.

>>493004
>Anyway, it's really the state propaganda machine and crackdowns which make garnering sympathy difficult.
Yeah, and they have the upper hand by being out in the open. It's very difficult to counter this stuff from the underground.