Seriously tho, 99% of the criticisms that completely deny Marxism I have ever heard came from people whose arguments could simply have been answered by "maybe actually read Marx?"
We do need to be a little careful with the “immortal science” thing. Of course historical materialism is a brilliant prism through which to view history and society, and I’d call it a science, but obviously it’s a “soft science”.
Sometimes I think we give off the impression that we believe dogmatically in Marx/Engels/Lenin’s individual utterances, which obviously shouldn’t be the case. They gave us the tools with which to analyse and devise the correct action for ourselves.
Yeah re-reading my post, I noticed it was poorly worded. I meant criticisms of Marxism from people who somehow believe capitalism works well the way it is. Obviously Marx is still not to be considered the bible. That being said, my point stands. If human civilization survives to live a hundred more year, nobody will remember Ben Shapiro or TPUSA, or Ayn Rand. Pretty sure Marx and Engels tho, will be remembered pretty well.
Yeh, 100%, I wasn’t accusing you of saying that. Just saying in general we need to be careful with that, I think it turns some people off Marxism because they think we’re a bunch of religious zealots obsessed with a 150 year old book.
To your original point, my favourite case of this was peterson showing up to debate Zizek about Marxism having basically skimmed the manifesto as preparation. What a clown.
I avoided citing this as an example at first because it seemed a bit unfair; like, Peterson is an idiot but I wanted to separate the fact that he hadn't done his homework (which was completely on him for being a dumbass) from the fact that completely dismissing Marx was impossible. But again if Peterson had actually read Marx maybe there wouldn't have been a debate at all lol
It's very funny how often things people criticize marxism for not considering things that are actually extremely central to it. "Marx didn't account for automation".
I feel like 90 % of criticism of marxist economics I hear are directly answered in text in the first two chapters of capital. Something about Marx makes people with no knowledge talk about him with a confidence I can only dream of.
"marx didn't account for automation" has to be one of the clearest examples of not even considering the era in which he lived let alone reading his work.
I geniunely can't remember ever hearing a modern capitalist criticise Marx in a way that didn't make it obvious they hadn't read a word of what the man wrote. All good (I.e. not literally nonsensical) criticism of Marx I've read came from other leftists.
I don't understand how people like Ben Shapiro and Jordan Peterson have managed to make a living "fighting Marxism" while also openly admitting they're just kind of guessing what it entails. Especially because a lot of their followers will tell you that you believe in Marxism because you simply "lack critical thinking skills".
Imagine swallowing every word that comes out of Ben Shapiro's mouth and tell someone else they lack critical thinking lmao
The Ben Shapiro phenomenon is just a result of right-libertarian think tank funding, which ultimately stems from fossil fuel billionaires. It's just the YouTube/podcast/internet propaganda arm of that ecosystem that's meant to target young, terminally-online, white Americans. Ben is just a failed writer who sincerely believes in what he says, and is paid to not question it too seriously. And why would he? I mean, besides getting embarrassed by everyone on the internet regularly.
Another example I can give, from personal experience, is my teacher of Political Science (boring ass course lol) at Uni, who told us first lesson that we needed to dismiss the notion of all human societies history being the history class struggle, without even telling us why in the first place (his explanation was a weird ass comparisons to why a leaf falls from a tree, which he ended up debunking himself later??).
Later on in the course he quoted Capital (yes, from mister Marx himself) as he was talking about economics, in order to backup his lesson point. Lmao
his reasoning was more like
One cannot predict history [as an argument against marx] with laws and rules just like one cannot predict the trajectory of a leaf falling from a tree.
Later on in this very same class, he went on to describe exactly what physical forces guided the leaf as it fell from the tree. No mention of Marx tho.
And I didn't even misinterpret this: he clearly said "one must fight this Marxist idea that history is but the history of class struggle."
it feels appropriate that a capitalist would use the same kind of argument christians use for the existence of god. the one I heard was, "no one knows where the wind comes from" or something.
now that I think about it, these aren't reasons for anything, they are an appeal to forgo critical thinking. They only make sense if you never ask, "Why can't I know how the leaf falls from the tree and figure out where iit might land?" or maybe, "I'm pretty sure someone with a passable knowledge of first year physics could give me a rough idea."
Uneducated is no excuse, if ex slaves could spout Marx and Sharecroppers learn to read with a copy of State and Revolution and a phonetic dictionary, no one has any excuse.
The only solid right-wing critique of Marxism I'm aware of that demonstrates a thorough understanding of his system is from Eugen von Bohm-Bawerk. His critique (pdf here, along with Hilferding's response) of the internal consistency of Capital was convincing enough that even most Marxists believed it for about 80yrs afterwards.
