• Cowbee [he/him, they/them]
    ·
    2 months ago

    Same here! I almost think reading just a bit of Marx does more harm than good, because idealism and liberalism fills in the gaps if you don't thoroughly purge them with an understanding of Dialectical and Historical Materialism first, rather than the usual path of understanding his critique of Capitalism and advocacy for collective ownership. A liberal and idealist analysis results in the weird ultra-Maoist liberal takes from people like Flying Squid, they don't even like Mao so what did they want to happen? Magic Marxism to elevate the productive forces? People to legitimately stay poor under a system without private property, but little productive forces to begin with?

    People who think you must go through Capitalism to get to Communism are wrong, of course, but so is the idea that a Dictatorship of the Proletariat carefully managing and pruning a market economy is suddenly Capitalist because there's Private Property.

    deng-drip

    • heggs_bayer
      ·
      2 months ago

      I almost think reading just a bit of Marx does more harm than good, because idealism and liberalism fills in the gaps if you don't thoroughly purge them with an understanding of Dialectical and Historical Materialism first, rather than the usual path of understanding his critique of Capitalism and advocacy for collective ownership.

      You get this a lot with people reading only the Manifesto and dismissing Marxism as childish.

      • Cowbee [he/him, they/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 months ago

        Flashbacks to Jordan Peterson v Zizek

        Not that Zizek is a Marxist, he's a Hegelian idealist and a court jester for Imperialism, but Peterson literally asserted that the Manifesto was the core document to Marxism, and not, you know, Capital peterson-pain zizek-preference marx-guns-blazing

      • roux [he/him, they/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 months ago

        This is why when I suggest texts, I give a damn list lol. You can't know it all by just reading the Manifesto. I also specify that my list is an intro. I haven't read it all and don't know it all but I have stuff I can suggest to get the ball rolling if they are willing to put in the effort.