When did Lenin say:

April 5, 2023 7:59 PM

Amir Ahmadi Arian, probably paraphrasing, said: "Vladimir Lenin once said when a revolutionary movement is defeated, politics is replaced with reactionary thinking, mysticism, and pornography." When/where did Lenin say something like that?
posted by clawsoon to Writing & Language (2 answers total)

Best answer: The principal stages in the history of Bolshevism (1920):

The years of reaction (1907–10). Tsarism was victorious. All the revolutionary and opposition parties were smashed. Depression, demoralisation, splits, discord, defection, and pornography took the place of politics. There was an ever greater drift towards philosophical idealism; mysticism became the garb of counter-revolutionary sentiments. At the same time, however, it was this great defeat that taught the revolutionary parties and the revolutionary class a real and very useful lesson, a lesson in historical dialectics, a lesson in an understanding of the political struggle, and in the art and science of waging that struggle. It is at moments of need that one learns who one’s friends are. Defeated armies learn their lesson...

posted by Fiasco da Gama at 8:12 PM on April 5, 2023 [5 favorites]

Response by poster: Thanks!
posted by clawsoon at 8:20 PM on April 5, 2023