Talk:Mass line

message: The below paragraph, written be another user, shows why Wikipedia needs a much more sophisticated editing system. Someone who has judged the mass-line to be 'sophistry, plain and simple' should not be allowed to edit and explain what the mass-line is. The fact that it was applied by millions of chinese students during the cultural revolution, and by many groups around the world, including the black panthers and contempariously, the naxalabri in India, must have escaped this user. Now this page is utterly flawed. Imagine if I went to edit the page on spiders and called them 'utterly gross creepers.' Now you may share that opinion but wikipedia is about explaining what something is - not opinion. What we currently have on this page is a giant horse shite of opinion. Self referencing to really stupid websites and non-peer reviewed works.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A00:23C6:7305:5B01:8927:7BB1:1F73:7895 (talk) 08:40, 2 August 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lack of understanding 

message: This article completely fails to define what exactly the Mass Line is, instead talking in circles and quoting people on how great the Mass Line is, and how this or that cool leftist has been a Mass Liner. The reason why no real definition exists is that the "Mass Line" concept is sophistry, plain and simple. 
When the CCP was almost destroyed in 1927, its survivors fled to the countryside the party became highly militarized. Slowly but surely, due to the constraints of guerrilla warfare, the Communist tradition of voting on issues came to an end, and all decisions had to come from the top.
Given these changes in the CCP, its new leaders, particularly Mao, had to rectify the Party's "democratic centralism" (the tradition of open discussion and voting) with the new social makeup of the Chinese Red Army and base areas, which were effectively military dictatorships run by Communists. Thus he came up with the "Mass Line." This idea is basically a substitute for inter-party democracy, a way for the CCP to keep its popular support and democratic image, while actually turning into a military clique.
The Mass Line is the idea that democracy isn't necessary for a working-class party, instead, all that's necessary is that the Party leader "checks up" on the poor sometimes to make sure they are not starving and they still support the Party.
I have the feeling that if I edit the page, some Maoists will strike me down and fill the article with even more mystical claptrap. Hopefully we can sort it all out with a debate here. I have edited out one part, though, and that is the claim that the Mass Line - a revision of Leninism - has its origins with Marx and Lenin.
Ahuitzotl (talk) 18:52, 19 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lack of clarity 

message: I looked at it and felt the same way as Ahuitzotl. I had this book here and flipped to Teiwes' chapter, and decided to get some stuff down. The article is written from the perspective of Maoism (I assume), so it's hard to understand. It would be good if the writing was not in the voice of the advocate, but instead simply describing these theories to someone who hadn't heard of them. Ahuitzotl, where did you get the information you said above? If there's a source, it can go in the article. I'm not sure if all my edits are helpful, but please take a look (whoever's watching) and check that out. --Asdfg12345 13:59, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: A bunch of edits, a source, some refs, some deletions

message: I'm going to delete most or everything that doesn't have references if no one pipes up about why it should be kept. It reads a bit like a communist pamphlet, making insider references that no one else would really get. I have some neutral sources on this here, I'm going to start adding them. Tagged for now. There should be many different perspectives on the page, including the official Maoist dogma (identified as such), but atm it's kinda unclear. If you are watching this page and can clear that up, please jump in. --Asdfg12345 00:34, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Warning

message: PCPP, please explain why you reverted to an old version of the article with no discussion, including deleting a bunch of good material. Thanks. I've warned you and will open an RfC about your conduct later. --Asdfg12345 22:36, 1 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Explanation for deletions 

message: It seems that the medium of Wikipedia itself is in decline.
It's remarkable that nobody has taken an interest in this article since 2009/2010, given that this has been such a major issue (in the news) just in the last few years.
This Wikipedia article remains so opaque and evasive, that it is actually much less informative about what "the mass line" is/was than direct propaganda from the (current) Chinese Communist Party.  That's a bad sign.Jep Tong (talk) 00:33, 28 June 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lack of Clarity (2014 edition!) 

message: Reading this article alone, I still have no sense of what the Mass Line is.  If I remember I'll try and research and give a proper definition at some point.--Ollyoxenfree (talk) 21:35, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Found something helpful, adding to lede with reference.--Ollyoxenfree (talk) 23:24, 22 September 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Definition