chapotraphouse

Well, how can acknowledging them help foster an internationalist working class? If there's a way to promote solidarity based on first hand accounts, sure why not, but if there isn't it's neither here nor there.

For example let's say we get some accounts from China. If the people of China are prospering, I can agitate and say that a better world is possible, just look at China, and at the same time it's a good argument against intervening in China. If things are bad in China, depending on the reasons, I could either analyze how their policies could have been different and save that criticism for when it's time to build a new socialist experiment, so we can learn from the mistakes of history. If the reasons stem from Western economic policies, then I can agitate by saying that our outdated system is harming millions of people. What I would never do, is shout from the rooftops that life in China is horrible, or worse than here, because that drives down morale and it makes people more likely to be complacent and fall for false consciousness or end-of-historyism. The main point is, as socialists, we should agree on supporting no war but the class war, and as proles we should be agitating, educating, and organizing; we should not be imperialist lap dogs and do the State Department's job for them.

Maybe the source of the disagreement here is that you could see discourse and political discussion as an endeavor that should be illuminating and pursue truth. I think there's value to that, but not in discourse, I save the truth seeking for when I read calmly and have the time to look for definitions/relevant historical facts. To me, the point of public discourse and political discussion is to exert class power and advance the position of the working class, heighten the contradictions when reasonable, and in even the smallest way to set the stage for a progressive change toward the next stage of history i.e. revolution. That can also involve dispelling some of the fictions of capitalist ideology, it can involve rhetoric, appealing to people's material situation, etc.