Opinion of the French Revolution

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

Well?

Easily, for me, one of the greatest revolutions in the history of mankind. Peacenik liberals may wax lyrical about peace over violence, but the truth is a Reign of Terror against the corrupt bourgeoisie today is far more necessary than in 1789.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

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

[RogueBeaver]

In the very long term, FR. Otherwise what Ernest said - though my preferred faction is definitely Feuillant.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

I'm sure you and your I-Phone, your Netflix account, your four bedroom gated subdivision home, and your fathers 2012 Subaru will be among the first of the "bourgeoisie" up against the wall, Phwezer.

Now, onto the subject, the French Revolution was, as Al accurately described it, complicated.

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

I'm sure you and your I-Phone, your Netflix account, your four bedroom gated subdivision home, and your fathers 2012 Subaru will be among the first of the "bourgeoisie" up against the wall, Phwezer.

What is this nonsensical "IF YOU'RE A LEFTIST AND DON'T GO TOTALLY OFF THE GRID YOU'RE A BIG FAT HYPOCRITE" argument...

The middle class were an integral part of the French Revolution. Nothing contradictory about me.

[ElectionsGuy]

FR!

[PiMp DaDdy FitzGerald]

Well?

Easily, for me, one of the greatest revolutions in the history of mankind. Peacenik liberals may wax lyrical about peace over violence, but the truth is a Reign of Terror against the corrupt bourgeoisie today is far more necessary than in 1789.

But the Reign of Terror wasn't against the corrupt bourgeoisie; in fact, it was about destroying the Aristocratic and Popular resistance against the government. If one could describe the French revolution as a class revolution, and there is a major school that does exactly that, then it was a bourgeoisie revolution.
Anyways, it's complicated but ultimately had important and necessary political effects. 

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

I'm sure you and your I-Phone, your Netflix account, your four bedroom gated subdivision home, and your fathers 2012 Subaru will be among the first of the "bourgeoisie" up against the wall, Phwezer.

What is this nonsensical "IF YOU'RE A LEFTIST AND DON'T GO TOTALLY OFF THE GRID YOU'RE A BIG FAT HYPOCRITE" argument...

The middle class were an integral part of the French Revolution. Nothing contradictory about me.

Want world equality? Give up your life of upper middle class luxury and go out among the poor and lead the revolution. 99% of the world envies you and Senior Porsche’s life, and would do anything to have it.

UNTIL THEN YOU'RE A BIG FAT HYPOCRITE.

[SWE]

Clearly a FR, although all of the bloodshed during the Reign of Terror was unnecessary

[H. Ross Peron]

Clearly a FR, although all of the bloodshed during the Reign of Terror was unnecessary

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

FR, especially the Reign of Terror.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

FR, especially the Reign of Terror.

Are you sure? They might take away the family Porsche!

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Well?

Easily, for me, one of the greatest revolutions in the history of mankind. Peacenik liberals may wax lyrical about peace over violence, but the truth is a Reign of Terror against the corrupt bourgeoisie today is far more necessary than in 1789.

You're a funny kid, you know that?

[SWE]

Well?

Easily, for me, one of the greatest revolutions in the history of mankind. Peacenik liberals may wax lyrical about peace over violence, but the truth is a Reign of Terror against the corrupt bourgeoisie today is far more necessary than in 1789.

Aren't you the same guy who said a leftist revolution could never succeed?

[TNF]

I'm sure you and your I-Phone, your Netflix account, your four bedroom gated subdivision home, and your fathers 2012 Subaru will be among the first of the "bourgeoisie" up against the wall, Phwezer.

What is this nonsensical "IF YOU'RE A LEFTIST AND DON'T GO TOTALLY OFF THE GRID YOU'RE A BIG FAT HYPOCRITE" argument...

The middle class were an integral part of the French Revolution. Nothing contradictory about me.

Want world equality? Give up your life of upper middle class luxury and go out among the poor and lead the revolution. 99% of the world envies you and Senior Porsche’s life, and would do anything to have it.

UNTIL THEN YOU'RE A BIG FAT HYPOCRITE.

Of course, if phwezer did all these things, you would still be calling him a hypocrite because you still consider him a member of the middle class. By your logic, he's damned if he does what you say and damned if he doesn't. But this is of course a very poor, inept line of argument that you are using to attack phwezer. Plenty of privileged people have been involved in revolutionary movements and have contributed to great leaps forward in society. Engels was a member of the bourgeoisie for example, and yet was still active in the socialist movement and ghost-wrote a lot more than he is given credit for.

Just because someone doesn't fit your stereotype of what a revolutionary is or what his or her background is does not mean that they are not eligible to participate in a revolutionary movement or speak on behalf of those that are unable to speak. If phwezer is a middle class person who wants to help those who aren't as fortunate, why would you tear him down for doing so? If anything, that kind of thing is something that needs to be encouraged, rather than shouted down by persons in (presumably) the same class like yourself. Of course in your case this likely stems from your own reactionary politics, which seek to turn back the wheel of history to an era that only existed in the bourgeois imagination: a despoiled America, a virgin land free from such curmudgeons and middle class revolutionaries (along with all the rabble) you so despise.

Anyway, the French Revolution was a massive Freedom Revolution. Arguing otherwise is the domain of the lunatic fringe of the far-right, which seeks to undo the centuries of progress made since the initial bourgeois revolutions of the 18th and 19th Centuries that really all started with the French in 1789 and the Americans in 1776. The Reign of Terror was a necessary and practical means of eliminating class enemies that wanted to strangle the revolution in it's birth. The only thing that I can really say negative about that is that yes, some of those executed were likely not counterrevolutionaries at all (notably many among the lower classes who were executed) and that it is unfortunate that more class enemies were not eradicated in the process. It is rather depressing that the French Revolution really did not live up to it's full potential and finish off what remained of feudalism across Europe; we're still stuck with the trash left over from that failure today (the Monarchies and nobility of Europe, state religion, etc.).

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

Well?

Easily, for me, one of the greatest revolutions in the history of mankind. Peacenik liberals may wax lyrical about peace over violence, but the truth is a Reign of Terror against the corrupt bourgeoisie today is far more necessary than in 1789.

Aren't you the same guy who said a leftist revolution could never succeed?

ANY sort of revolution/uprising in America would be difficult, left-wing or right-wing (if there is one thing that can match capitalists' love for money, it is the capitalists' love for stability). You'd be going up against the most powerful military in the world, which most of the nations/capitalists would support (particularly if it was right-wing). But as the French revolution, the American revolution, the Vietnam War, and other conflicts show, it's hardly impossible for a smaller, weaker force to go up against a stronger enemy and win. And in general, leftists must have faith in the revolution, for if they do not, they will meekly sit by and watch as capitalists strangle the proletariat in their graves.

[TNF]

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

You can't really have a revolution without eliminating those elements that warrant having a revolution in the first place.

[politicus]

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

You can't really have a revolution without eliminating those elements that warrant having a revolution in the first place.

The reign of terror was primarily directed against other revolutionaries deemed insufficiently radical or a threat to Robespierre's power.

[Maxwell]

Lean FR, though I could do without especially the second half of the Reign of Terror where they were just executing other revolutionaries.

[TNF]

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

You can't really have a revolution without eliminating those elements that warrant having a revolution in the first place.

The reign of terror was primarily directed against other revolutionaries deemed insufficiently radical or a threat to Robespierre's power.

If they were insufficiently radical at that stage of the revolution, they were in effect counter-revolutionaries, because the revolution had progressed beyond the initial stages that many erstwhile class enemies (that is, the liberal sections of the nobility that initially backed the movement for a constitutional monarchy) felt comfortable with. So I hold no sympathy for them. They were holding up the revolutionary process and the sweeping away of the decrepit feudal system. The revolutionaries were in the right. The Reign of Terror is miniscule in comparison to generation after generation that died at the hand of the repressive, rigid, reactionary feudal system and it's Kings, Queens, Noblemen, and clerics.

[🐒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.

[H. Ross Peron]

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

You can't really have a revolution without eliminating those elements that warrant having a revolution in the first place.

The reign of terror was primarily directed against other revolutionaries deemed insufficiently radical or a threat to Robespierre's power.

If they were insufficiently radical at that stage of the revolution, they were in effect counter-revolutionaries, because the revolution had progressed beyond the initial stages that many erstwhile class enemies (that is, the liberal sections of the nobility that initially backed the movement for a constitutional monarchy) felt comfortable with. So I hold no sympathy for them. They were holding up the revolutionary process and the sweeping away of the decrepit feudal system. The revolutionaries were in the right. The Reign of Terror is miniscule in comparison to generation after generation that died at the hand of the repressive, rigid, reactionary feudal system and it's Kings, Queens, Noblemen, and clerics.

These people certainly weren't one of the "liberal nobles": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_H%C3%A9bert
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antoine-Fran%C3%A7ois_Momoro

The irony is that considering most Marxists would have closest to Hebertist views, they probably would have been suppressed by the bourgeois radical Jacobins along with the monarchists and the Girondins.

[Cassius]

Awful. I think, at first, it was of course reasonable that the third estate be granted more power, being composed of what could be described as the 'middle classes' of the nation. However, following the fall of the Bastille, the revolution quickly descends into a morass of state atheism, mindless butchery, psychotic foreign policies and general wanton destruction of the old order generally speaking. Its a grim, grim period, one which produced nothing to be pleased about, unless one like chaos and terror being the order of the day. Of course, the King himself, and his advisors, can shoulder much of the blame for their poor handling of the initial stages of the revolution; but, the lions share of the blame for this catastrophe should go to the Jacobins (or at least their leaders); evil, evil men, who laid waste to everything they could lay their hands on, from the lives of individuals, to French foreign policy, to the 'justice' system and to the economy.

[IceSpear]

Proletariat Revolucion: Coming to a gated community near you!

[Antonio the Sixth]

Freedom Revolution (not a disgusting reactionary POS)