The boycott of parliamentary institutions on the part of anarchists and semianarchists is dictated by a desire not to submit their weakness to a test on the part of the masses, thus preserving their right to an inactive hauteur which makes no difference to anybody. A revolutionary party can turn its back to a parliament only if it has set itself the immediate task of overthrowing the existing regime.
Leon TrotskySimultaneously the Left Opposition in the course of several years carried on a struggle against the Stalinists in favor of collectivization.
Leon TrotskyAs for us, we were never concerned with the Kantian-priestly and vegetarian-Quaker prattle about the sacredness of human life.
Leon TrotskyThe bourgeoisie, which far surpasses the proletariat in the completeness and irreconcilibility of its class consciousness, is vitally interested in imposing its moral philosophy upon the exploited masses. It is exactly for this purpose that the concrete norms of the bourgeois catechism are concealed under moral abstractions...The appeal to abstract norms is not a disinterested philosophic mistake but a necessary element in the mechanics of class deception.
Leon TrotskyReligions are illogical primitive ignorance. There is nothing as ridiculous and tragic as a religious government.
Leon TrotskyTranscending class distinctions, the speaker [Stalin] portrays the relation between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat as a mere division of labor. The workers and soldiers achieve the revolution, Guchkov and Miliukov "fortify" it.[...] This superintendent's approach to the historical process is exactly characteristic of the leaders of Menshevism, this handing out of instructions to various classes and then patronizingly criticizing their fulfillment.
Leon Trotsky