Mon, 09 Jun 2025 18:13:53 GMT

"Bourgeois morality, shaped by the capitalist class’s need to protect its property and legitimacy, equates violence not with actual harm, but with challenges to capitalist order.

"Louis Althusser noted that ideology works by embedding the ruling class’s interests into everyday assumptions. In this light, the charge of “violence” becomes an ideological weapon deployed by institutions, police, media, courts to reproduce capitalist dominance. A peaceful die-in blocking a corporate lobby is called violent. A riot in response to police murder is called lawless and criminal. Meanwhile, capitalist violence, layoffs, redlining, poisoned water, rent hikes goes unremarked.

"This moral double standard serves a clear function: it delegitimises resistance that does not play by the rules of the ruling class. The bourgeoisie, after all, must present its domination as natural and peaceful. When revolutionaries reveal the brutality behind this peace, bourgeois morality kicks in to reassert control. It does so not with argument, but with accusation: You are violent."

"The rejection of bourgeois morality is not a descent into nihilism, it is the beginning of political maturity. As Aimé Césaire put it, “No one colonizes innocently.” Likewise, no one resists effectively while clinging to the moral codes of their oppressors.

"The morality of the capitalist class cannot be our guide.

"Bourgeois morality exists to protect bourgeois power. It names violence only when it serves that end. If we are to build a world where justice, care, and freedom flourish, we must abandon the moral rules that tell us to be silent, civil, and safe in the face of oppression. The truth is simple: they call us violent because they fear what would happen if we stopped caring about their rules."

https://blacklodges.substack.com/p/nonviolence-is-pacification