Opinion of the French Revolution

[ingemann]

Horrible Revolution which killed millions and caused 50 years of reactionary dominance in Europe (not a disgusting supporter of mass murder).

[Antonio the Sixth]

Horrible Revolution which killed millions and caused 50 years of reactionary dominance in Europe (not a disgusting supporter of mass murder).

[Meursault]

Freedom Revolution, but not aesthetically pleasing enough compared to Red October, the March On Rome, or the Nazi Seizure Of Power. It needed uniforms and a centrifugal iconography.

[DC Al Fine]

Obviously some reforms were needed, but I fail to see why mass executions and war-mongering outweigh the need for reform. As ingemann noted, the revolution probably held back reform in other countries, since every king and aristocrat had visions of guillotines dancing in their heads.

[Cassius]

Horrible Revolution which killed millions and caused 50 years of reactionary dominance in Europe (not a disgusting supporter of mass murder).

You did start the use of the word disgusting.

Obviously some reforms were needed, but I fail to see why mass executions and war-mongering outweigh the need for reform. As ingemann noted, the revolution probably held back reform in other countries, since every king and aristocrat had visions of guillotines dancing in their heads.

Exactly. I mean, the revolution helped to impede the progress of parliamentary reform in the UK for roughly 40 years. I really don't understand why some of our revolutionary leftists have such sympathy for the French revolution though. I mean, sure, you had packs of working class people running around killing and thieving wherever, but the revolution was very much directed by middle-class intellectuals (along with a few turncoats from the nobility) for their own ends (I believe, though don't quote me on this, that the Robespierre regime restricted the formation of trade unions by the working classes).

[courts]

horrific with deeply negative consequences, though less so than the american revolution. that said i would have supported it. death to the monarchy (normal)

[ingemann]

Obviously some reforms were needed, but I fail to see why mass executions and war-mongering outweigh the need for reform. As ingemann noted, the revolution probably held back reform in other countries, since every king and aristocrat had visions of guillotines dancing in their heads.

Correct if you look at the period up to the French Revolution and the years until the French began their massive murder-pillage-rape tour through Europe. There had been many reforms, serfdom had been abolished in many European states, land reform pushed through, religious tolerance was increasing etc.

When the French came and not only was million killed, after the war was over and reforms m ore or less stopped until 1848 except for some around 1830, and the ones which followed was nowhere as liberal.

Compare the removal of serfdom in Austria and Bohemia with the ones in Hungary. In the former a land reform followed, which made the Austrian and Bohemian peasantry a rural middle class, while in Hungary they was made into a impoverish underclass.

Spain was caught in circle of poverty for over a century after the Peninsula War, after they was reforming in the late 18th century.

Of course while I don't see the rise of nationalism as only a bad thing, we can more or less thank the French invasion of Germany for the birth of blood and soil nationalism, rather than the French and American-style state nationalism which dominated Europe before the French decided to mess everything up.

[politicallefty]

HR, due to the Reign of Terror. Otherwise, I'd have voted FR.

[TNF]

TNF is making a perfect case for its horribleness. The idea that being a "class enemy" or "counterrevolutionary" - however it is convenient for a council of fanatics to define those terms at any given time - makes one justly eligible for the death squads, is one of the most pernicious ideas in the history of mankind.

Again, the choice was between a temporary Terror against those who had inflicted a generations-long Terror against everyone in Europe or allowing that generations-long Terror to continue. The idea that all violence is equal is stunningly idiotic. The French people were absolutely justified in lopping off the heads of those who had tormented them for centuries and kept them ignorant and in a state of privation. The enemies of mankind deserve nothing less than absolute Terror for their role in enslaving and exploiting the bulk of the population.

You all want what never was and never will be: a peaceful resolution to class struggle. Either one class wins in the course of the class struggle and eradicates the previous exploiting class (as was the case of the emerging bourgeoisie against the feudal parasites) or both classes are mutually destroyed in the process in the class struggle (as in the transition from the slave society of Rome to the feudal society of Europe). There can be no victory of one revolutionary force over a reactionary force, or even a staying action of a reactionary force over a revolutionary force without bloodshed. Those of you arguing against the Terror paint yourselves as high-minded and above it all, but in doing so you ultimately choose the side of those who were punished for exploiting the masses, that is, you take the side of the feudal reactionaries. This is a two way street. Embracing the Revolution means embracing the Terror, for the Terror was both necessary for the Revolution to succeed and an integral part of sweeping away the decrepit foundations of feudal society in order to unleash the bourgeois revolution.

Of course the irony here is that so many of those opposed to the French bourgeois revolution are arch-capitalists, and capitalism would have stalled as a system without continual expansion in the form of these bourgeois revolutions. The Terror played out in a microcosm in other bourgeois revolutions as well, from the execution of Charles in England to the confiscation of the land of the traitors during the American Revolution and whatnot. But I don't see a lot of hemming and hawing about those.

[Lief 🗽]

FR, including the Reign of Terror obviously.

[TNF]

Exactly. I mean, the revolution helped to impede the progress of parliamentary reform in the UK for roughly 40 years. I really don't understand why some of our revolutionary leftists have such sympathy for the French revolution though. I mean, sure, you had packs of working class people running around killing and thieving wherever, but the revolution was very much directed by middle-class intellectuals (along with a few turncoats from the nobility) for their own ends (I believe, though don't quote me on this, that the Robespierre regime restricted the formation of trade unions by the working classes).

At least from a Marxist standpoint, there's not really any reason not to have sympathy for the French Revolution because at that time the bourgeoisie was the revolutionary element in society. There was no proletariat as we conceptualize it now, and indeed, there could not be a generalized proletariat without first the success of the bourgeois revolutions and the ascent of bourgeois liberalism and bourgeois democracy to the halls of power across Europe. Anarchists of course might disagree, but they don't all subscribe to historical materialism/dialectical materialism so that might be cause for some of the friction there.

[DC Al Fine]

Exactly. I mean, the revolution helped to impede the progress of parliamentary reform in the UK for roughly 40 years. I really don't understand why some of our revolutionary leftists have such sympathy for the French revolution though. I mean, sure, you had packs of working class people running around killing and thieving wherever, but the revolution was very much directed by middle-class intellectuals (along with a few turncoats from the nobility) for their own ends (I believe, though don't quote me on this, that the Robespierre regime restricted the formation of trade unions by the working classes).

At least from a Marxist standpoint, there's not really any reason not to have sympathy for the French Revolution because at that time the bourgeoisie was the revolutionary element in society. There was no proletariat as we conceptualize it now, and indeed, there could not be a generalized proletariat without first the success of the bourgeois revolutions and the ascent of bourgeois liberalism and bourgeois democracy to the halls of power across Europe. Anarchists of course might disagree, but they don't all subscribe to historical materialism/dialectical materialism so that might be cause for some of the friction there.

I read a sci fi novel that made a similar point. The communist astronauts were confused because they had to help the capitalist aliens against their feudalist foes

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It's too early to say.

[Barnes]

It's totally absurd to compare the early years of the revolution (1789 to about 1791) as bearing any resemblance to the following decade of instability.  The period of the Reign of Terror itself only takes up a period of roughly ten months from 1793 to 1794 and cannot at all be viewed as an objective of the first stage of the revolution. 

[Mopsus]

Freedom Revolution, but not aesthetically pleasing enough compared to Red October, the March On Rome, or the Nazi Seizure Of Power. It needed uniforms and a centrifugal iconography.

I've read that a contingent of Revolutionaries (the Freemason ones, probably) had a strong affiliation for Ancient Egyptian imagery, and there were even plans to include such imagery in the architecture of post-Revolution Paris. It's too bad that those plans never came to fruition.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

It's too early to say.

Boooo.... I was going to make that post

[politicus]

It's too early to say.

Its a nice quote, but likely he was talking about 1968.

http://mediamythalert.wordpress.com/2011/06/14/too-early-to-say-zhou-was-speaking-about-1968-not-1789/

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

The French people were absolutely justified in lopping off the heads of those who had tormented them for centuries and kept them ignorant and in a state of privation.

They must have had long lifespans back then.

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

The French people were absolutely justified in lopping off the heads of those who had tormented them for centuries and kept them ignorant and in a state of privation.

They must have had long lifespans back then.

Oh are you really going to play dumb semantics now? You and I both know what TNF meant.

[Mechaman]

The French people were absolutely justified in lopping off the heads of those who had tormented them for centuries and kept them ignorant and in a state of privation.

They must have had long lifespans back then.

Oh are you really going to play dumb semantics now? You and I both know what TNF meant.

Still kind of damn funny though.  I won't lie.

But yeah, lol at everyone's outrage here.  Did you expect one of the loudest revolutions of the 18th century, a revolution that was well to the left of the goals of the American one that was a revolt against an entrenched hereditary and aristocratic system of landed elites by people who lived in a level of mass poverty that many of us can't even imagine to have gone peacefully?  Or with as little violence and as much politeness as possible?

I'll file this one next to "Why were labor unions so radical and violent?"

[Oldiesfreak1854]

A revolution was probably needed, but it didn't need a Reign of Terror to achieve it.

[Lechasseur]

Reform was needed, and the revolution started off well, but the crazies took over around 1791 or so and that's when it went downhill. HP

The Constitution of 1791 was in theory very good though (until the crazies took over the National Assembly)

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

TNF is making a perfect case for its horribleness. The idea that being a "class enemy" or "counterrevolutionary" - however it is convenient for a council of fanatics to define those terms at any given time - makes one justly eligible for the death squads, is one of the most pernicious ideas in the history of mankind.

Again, the choice was between a temporary Terror against those who had inflicted a generations-long Terror against everyone in Europe or allowing that generations-long Terror to continue. The idea that all violence is equal is stunningly idiotic. The French people were absolutely justified in lopping off the heads of those who had tormented them for centuries and kept them ignorant and in a state of privation. The enemies of mankind deserve nothing less than absolute Terror for their role in enslaving and exploiting the bulk of the population.

You all want what never was and never will be: a peaceful resolution to class struggle. Either one class wins in the course of the class struggle and eradicates the previous exploiting class (as was the case of the emerging bourgeoisie against the feudal parasites) or both classes are mutually destroyed in the process in the class struggle (as in the transition from the slave society of Rome to the feudal society of Europe). There can be no victory of one revolutionary force over a reactionary force, or even a staying action of a reactionary force over a revolutionary force without bloodshed. Those of you arguing against the Terror paint yourselves as high-minded and above it all, but in doing so you ultimately choose the side of those who were punished for exploiting the masses, that is, you take the side of the feudal reactionaries. This is a two way street. Embracing the Revolution means embracing the Terror, for the Terror was both necessary for the Revolution to succeed and an integral part of sweeping away the decrepit foundations of feudal society in order to unleash the bourgeois revolution.

Of course the irony here is that so many of those opposed to the French bourgeois revolution are arch-capitalists, and capitalism would have stalled as a system without continual expansion in the form of these bourgeois revolutions. The Terror played out in a microcosm in other bourgeois revolutions as well, from the execution of Charles in England to the confiscation of the land of the traitors during the American Revolution and whatnot. But I don't see a lot of hemming and hawing about those.

This truly is an eloquent and chilling expression of what Eric Vogelin referred to as "gnosticism" in the political realm.