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Old May 14th, 2013 #27
Alex Linder
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Free and open discussion, which existed in the West, represented the greatest threat to Lenin's arrogation of intellectual infallibility. Two points can be noted. First, a free press protected in law cannot be easily manipulated, and Lenin can, of course, be attacked with impunity. Journalists will resist control by a small group of individuals - Lenin's party for example. Second, the very lack of centralised control means that the concentrated essence of ideology, deemed by Lenin to be a precondition for the pursuit and consolidation of power will not be achieved. This leads to heterodoxy, ideological deviation and debasement of the medium for less serious purposes (entertainment, sensationalism, tabloid journalism, for example). Nevertheless, Lenin argues that within the party: 'Free speech and the freedom of the press must be total' (Lenin, 1947, 29), subject to the caveat that the party reserves the rigth to expel those who propagate anti-party views. Regarding the prcedure to be adopted for ascertaining 'anti-party views', Lenin makes the following point:

Quote:
The party's programme, the party's tactical resolutions and its code and finally the entire experience of international social-democracy, of international voluntary alliances of the proletariat, which while constantly incorporating into their parties individual elements or trends, which are not entirely consistent, Marxist, or correct, but additionally, constantly initiating periodic "purges" of their party, shall serve to determine the line separating party views from anti-party ones (Lenin, 1947, 29).
So the party, in order that it preserve orthodoxy, must resort to periodic purges of incorrect elements whose incorrect status shall be determined by the party elite in accordance with the doctrine of democratic centralism. Lenin provides an ideological justification for terror against the party itself and against any opposition to the party from outside. In such apparently innocuous, theoretical beginnings we find the genesis of communist terror which has had truly catastrophic consequences in the twentieth century. Terror itself is politically correct.