Read theory, it's literally online for free. Join a reading group. You spend hours doom scrolling on Twitter to no end. All that's gotten you is deep knowledge of every twitter beef between 400 follower nazbols.

Edit: It’s not an issue with the site but online discourse about the left in general. Why are y'all upset about shoeonhead or black hammer or whatever new group of dumbasses is saying some new dumb shit. I'm talking about how every few days lots of leftists are surprised and upset that their fav twitter personality said something really stupid.

  • ABigguhPizzahPieh [none/use name,any]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Theory is the distilled experience of millions of comrades who have lived and died in pursuit of human freedom and emancipation. You literally cannot understand what went wrong and how we came to live in hell world without understanding what has been tried and why it was tried. You cant understand where your task begins if you don't know where the tasks of comrades who came before us ended. I promise you its worth it.

      • viva_la_juche [they/them, any]
        ·
        4 years ago

        its always gonna be more valuable to go straight to the source if possible bc you never know how it was filtered through someone else but the two can work well together and if right now podcasts only is helping you that's fine too I'd just consider looking into it some day if it strikes you. :)

          • viva_la_juche [they/them, any]
            ·
            4 years ago

            nah for sure i just used it as a jumping off point. I do agree with op mostly that theory is important and helps people get up to speed and be informed on things but i recognize its daunting and just want to be encouraging and not berate people. Desalines has tons of theory on his channel as well as audible socialism you can check out or if you're more into anarchism theres an audible anarchism too. You can almost always find a free audiobook version of a book just searching its name on youtube and audiobook, I listen to a lot of theory while wallking my dog

        • invalidusernamelol [he/him]M
          ·
          4 years ago

          It's always good to read the source material either before or after listening to a podcast. That way you not only get more from the podcast (as you know what they're talking about and can focus on it better), but also more from the book through a differing perspective.

        • pluggd [they/them]
          ·
          4 years ago

          Yes but what about if you listen to every podcast? Doesn't matter about anything being filtered through someone else then, and you still never have to read any theory. 🧠

          • viva_la_juche [they/them, any]
            ·
            4 years ago

            i mean getting various perspectives on something definitely can help you get closer to the truth and is a decent facsimile of dialectics if it's all that is available though it's still not going to be as informing as going direct to the source there's still filtering happening your just trying to sus out a cohesion through various 2nd hand sources. Also I think the amount of effort and time invested listening to a multitude of podcasts is way higher than just reading the book tho lol. But again if that's more enjoyable at least you're getting something which is better than nothing

            • pluggd [they/them]
              ·
              4 years ago

              Yeah, agree with that. One of the overlooked benefits of pods is the insight into conversations around the reading. Conversations that would have been had in reading groups or union halls or meetings back in the day, that we're not having because of the atomised lives we lead now. People hearing these conversations, even parasocially, from the outside, has value imo.