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Here are a collection of quotes which show the need for Socialist Patriotism and how Communists are patriotic.

Part 7 of This Series:

“We congratulate the American people upon your re-election by a large majority. If resistance to the Slave Power was the reserved watchword of your first election, the triumphant war cry of your re-election is Death to Slavery. From the commencement of the titanic American strife the workingmen of Europe felt instinctively that the star-spangled banner carried the destiny of their class. The contest for the territories which opened the dire epopee, was it not to decide whether the virgin soil of immense tracts should be wedded to the labour of the emigrant or prostituted by the tramp of the slave driver?” - Karl Marx

“We are full of a sense of national pride, and for that very reason we particularly hate our slavish past (when the landed nobility led the peasants into war to stifle the freedom of Hungary, Poland, Persia and China), and our slavish present, when these selfsame landed proprietors, aided by the capitalists, are loading us into a war in order to throttle Poland and the Ukraine, crush the democratic movement in Persia and China, and strengthen the gang of Romanovs, Bobrinskys and Purishkeviches, who are a disgrace to our Great-Russian national dignity. Nobody is to be blamed for being born a slave; but a slave who not only eschews a striving for freedom but justifies and eulogises his slavery (eg. calls the throttling of Poland and the Ukraine, etc. a ‘defence of the fatherland’ of the Great Russians) - such a slave is a lickspittle and a boor, who arouses a legitimate feeling of indignation, contempt, and loathing” - V.I. Lenin

“But people cannot live together, for lengthy periods unless they have a common territory. Englishmen and Americans originally inhabited the same territory, England, and constituted one nation. Later, one section of the English emigrated from England to a new territory, America, and there, in the new territory, in the course of time, came to form the new American nation. Difference of territory led to the formation of different nations” - (J.V. Stalin, Marxism and The National Question)

“The government of the United States represents, as its army also does, the finances of the United States. But these finances do not represent the North American people; they represent a small group of financiers, the owners of all the big enterprises… who also exploit the North American people. Clearly they do not exploit them in the same manner that they exploit us, the human beings of inferior races… for we have not had the good fortune of being born from blood, Anglo-Saxon parents. But they do exploit and divide them, they too are divided into black and whites, and they too are divided into men and women, union and non-union, employed and unemployed” - Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara

“At first, patriotism, not yet Communism, led me to have confidence in Lenin… By studying Marxism-Leninism parallel with participation in practical activities, I gradually came upon the fact that only Socialism and Communism can liberate the oppressed nations and the working people” - Hồ Chí Minh

“All men are created equal; they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights; among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” - (Hồ Chí Minh, The Vietnamese Constitution, in a direct quote from the American Constitution)

“I call on the workers, peasants, revolutionary intellectuals, enlightened elements of the bourgeoisie and other enlightened persons of all colours in the world, whether white, black, yellow or brown, to unite to oppose the racial discrimination practised by U.S. imperialism and support the American Negroes in their struggle against racial discrimination. In the final analysis, national struggle is a matter of class struggle. Among the whites in the United States, it is only the reactionary ruling circles who oppress the Negro people. They can in no way represent the workers, farmers, revolutionary intellectuals and other enlightened persons who comprise the overwhelming majority of the white people. At present, it is the handful of imperialists headed by the United States, and their supporters, the reactionaries in different countries, who are oppressing, committing agression against and menacing the overwhelmingly majority of nations and peoples of the world. We are in the majority and they are in the minority. At most, they make up less than 10 percent of the 3,000 million population of the world. I am firmly convinced that with the support of more than 90 percent of the people of the world, the American Negroes will be victorious in their just struggle. The evil system of colonialism and imperialism arose and throve with the enslavement of Negroes and the trade in Negroes, and it will surely come to its end” - Mao Zedong

“Can a Communist, who is an internationalist, at the same time be a patriot? We hold that he not only can be but also must be. The specific content of patriotism is determined by historical conditions. There is the ‘patriotism’ of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler, and there is our patriotism. Communists must resolutely oppose the ‘patriotism’ of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler. The Communists of Japan and Germany are defeatists with regard to the wars being waged by their countries. To bring about the defeat of the Japanese aggressors and of Hitler by every possible means is in the interests of the Japanese and the German people, and the more complete the defeat the better. This is what the Japanese and German Communists should be doing and what they are doing. For the wars launched by the Japanese aggressors and Hitler are harming the people at home as well as the people of the world. China’s case, however, is different, because she is the victim of aggression. Chinese Communists must therefore combine patriotism with internationalism. We are at once internationalists and patriots, and our slogan is, ‘Fight to defend the motherland against the aggressors.’ For us defeatism is a crime and to strive for victory in the War of Resistance is an inescapable duty. For only by fighting in defense of the motherland can we defeat the aggressors and achieve national liberation. And only by achieving national liberation will it be possible for the proletariat and other working people to achieve their own emancipation. The victory of China and the defeat of the invading imperialists will help the people of other countries. Thus in wars of national liberation patriotism is applied internationalism” - Mao Zedong

“The U.S. government still has a veil of democracy, but it has been cut down to a tiny patch by the U.S. reactionaries and become very faded, and is not what it used to be in the days of Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln. The reason is that the class struggle has become more intense. When the class struggle becomes still more intense, the veil of U.S. democracy will inevitably be flung to the four winds” - Mao Zedong

“The United States, had first fought a progressive war of independence from British imperialism, and then fought a civil war to establish a free labour market. Washington and Lincoln were progressive men of their time. When the United States first established a republic it was hated and dreaded by all the crowned heads of Europe. That showed that the Americans were then revolutionaries. Now the American people need to struggle for liberation from their own monopoly capitalists” - Mao Zedong

“Society pushed us on to the political stage. Who ever thought of indulging in Marxism previously? I hadn’t even heard of it. What I had heard of, and also read of, was Confucius, Napoleon, Washington, Peter the Great, the Meiji Restoration, the three distinguished Italian [patriots] - in other words, all those [heroes] of capitalism. I had also read a biography of Franklin. He came from a poor family; afterwards, he became a writer, and also conducted experiments on electricity” - Mao Zedong

“From the beginning of our policy in regard to the national bourgeoisie was not only to carry out the anti-imperialist, anti-feudal democratic revolution together with them, but also to take them (proletarianisation) along with us to a socialist, Communist society” - Kim Il-sung

“Patriotism is not an empty concept. Education in patriotism cannot be conducted simply by erecting the slogan, ‘Let us arm ourselves with the spirit of socialist patriotism!’ Educating people in the spirit of patriotism must begin with fostering the idea of caring for every tree planted on the road side, for the chairs and desks in the school… There is no doubt that a person who has formed the habit of cherishing common property from childhood will grow up to be a valuable patriot” - Kim Il-sung

“Marxism-Leninism is ultimately deeply internationalist and, at the same time, deeply patriotic” - Fidel Castro

"The U.S. flag is your flag, you cannot allow the U.S. ruling class to own the flag. The working class of the U.S. must fight for the flag and once socialism is established it is up to the workers to decide what they want to do with flag and the U.S. as it exists - (Fidel Castro, Addressing a group of students who did not want to associate with their flag while people from other countries sat next to theirs)

“Patriotism is not a mere slogan. A patriot is one who closely intertwines his/her own ideals with the future of the country, and his/her life with the fate of the nation” - Xi Jinping

"Everything we Chinese Communists do is to better the lives of the Chinese people, renew the Chinese nation, and promote peace and development for humanity - Xi Jinping

Part 8:

  • enigmaOP
    4•2 years ago

    Just to clarify that this selection of quotes is targeted in particular towards the question of Socialist Patriotism in America but also applies internationally.

    – General Overview:

    – Quotes -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7 -8 -9 -10 -11 -12 – Videos -1 -2 -3

    – Patriotism is Inseperable From Socialism -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7

    – (Real) American Patriotism -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7 -8 -9 -10 -11 -12

    – SwAC -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 – Land Reform -1 -2 -3 – Populism -1 -2 -3 -4 -5

    – To My Detractors -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7 -8 – Counter Arguments -1 -2 -3 -4 -5

    – Actually Existing Socialist States and Communist Parties -1 -2 -3 -4 -5 -6 -7 -8

    “The fact that the proletariat defends the freedom of the nations, their independence and national traditions is an expression of the patriotism of the working class, which is the direct opposite of both the chauvinist and cosmpolitan ideology of the bourgeoisie. The patriotism of the working class springs primarily from the feeling of pride in the contribution that the people or nation concerned has made to the struggle of the oppressed and exploited masses for their liberation from exploitation and oppression. The patriotism of the working class is therefore profoundly progressive and revolutionary. Bourgeois propaganda tries to represent the capitalist class as the bearer of patriotic feelings. They want to slur over the fact that the patriotism of the bourgeoisie is always subordinate to its selfish, narrow class interests, and to disparage the patriotism of the working class and Communists. In this connection, bourgeois propagandists sometimes refer to the passage in the Communist Manifesto which says that ‘the working men have no country’. It is perfectly clear, however, that it is not a question of repudiating the fatherland, but of the fact that in a society ruled by capitalists the fatherland is actually usurped by exploiters and is not a good father but a vicious stepfather to the workers. By overthrowing the rule of the exploiting classes the working class creates the conditions for the fullest possible manifestation of its patriotism, for it itself is the true bearer of patriotism in our time. Developing the Marxist point of view regarding the fatherland, Lenin wrote in 1908: ‘The fatherland, i.e., the given political, cultural and social environment, is the most powerful factor in the class struggle of the proletariat… The proletariat cannot be indifferent to and unconcerned about the political, social and cultural conditions of its struggle and, consequently, cannot remain indifferent to the fate of its country. But the fate of the country interest it only to the extent that they affect its class struggle, and not in virtue of some bourgeois ‘patriotism’, quite indecent on the lips of a Social-Democrat.’ Bourgeois ideologists allege that by combating cosmopolitanism Marxists disavow the international character of their doctrine and become nationalists. But the authors of such falsifications perpetrate a double forgery. Firstly, they put a sign of equality between the cosmopolitanism of the bourgeoisie and the internationalism of the working class, and, secondly, they ascribe to Marxists the nationalist views which are characteristic precisely of bourgeois ideology. The internationalism of the working class is, as already stated, an expression of the community of interests of the workers of all countries in their struggle against their common enemy - capitalism, of the unity of their aim, the abolition of exploitation of man by man… and the unity of their ideology - the ideology of friendship and fraternity of the peoples. In this sense all workers belong to the same ‘nation’ - the world ‘nation’ of working people oppressed and exploited in all bourgeois countries by the same force - capital. This does not in any way mean, however, that while belonging to the single international army of working people, the worker ceases to be a Frenchman, Englishman, etc. Quite the contrary. True and not sham patriotism springs naturally from proletarian internationalism. In point of fact, does not faithfulness to the ultimate ideal of the working class imbue the workers with a fervent desire to see their own people free, prosperous, and achieving social progress? Seeking liberation from all forms of oppression and exploitation… The working class wants this not only for itself, but also for all the working people, for the whole nation. Only the achievement of the ultimate aims of the working class, i.e., the overthrow of the power of the exploiters, who impede the progress of the nation… and the building of socialism, can bring every nation real freedom, independence and national greatness. It follows that the most internationalist class - the working class - is at the same time the most patriotic class" - (Otto Wille Kuusinen, Fundamentals of Marxism-Leninism)