You don't need to go shouting it, but if someone starts talking politics at you, fucking own it. Some coworker is like "trump sucks", say "yeah I know, I'm a communist". Your grandpa says "trump rules", say "no he sucks ass, I'm a communist". You're on a date and they ask who you're voting for? Say "I'm a communist". Cashier asks would you like change? "Yes, I am a communist".
Be open about your politics and lay claim to the title. Be a communist.
Let's do a roleplay to demonstrate. I will be the buffoonish ignoramus who only knows communism bad.
What do you mean you're a communist? Like China or Stalin? Those guys are bad.
I'm gonna take this seriously like ur a coworker or stranger, u guys critique me
Nah not like that really, more like... original Marx stuff combined with Bernie Sanders. It's not that radical when you get down to it, essentially that most resources should be democratically controlled instead of by a single weirdo like zuckerberg.
Probably wouldn't go on that long unless they continued to seem with me
Good effort, but do you think they would know what you mean by "original Marx stuff"? You should be ready to explain any terms you're introducing. They would probably know Marx purely through the lens of propaganda, so phrasing it that way may be putting an obstacle. Making a Bernie comparison is useful, though, because it gives people a touchstone to a popular and well-known figure, even if his politics are not quite where we want to be. How else could you put it?
You're right - swap out Marx for something like "the fact everyone knows to be true, that there are rich fucks controlling politics and the economy instead of the people as intended"
Ooh let me take a crack at this -- I love slowly introducing leftist concepts to my liberal coworkers.
"What do you mean you’re a communist? Like China or Stalin? Those guys are bad."
I'm not going to get into the decades of western propaganda that we've been inundated with, but no - not like China or Stalin. Why do corporations and a small handful of people, like Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, and many more, get to spend their lives in incredible comfort and hoard money that they only received by exploiting their workers, consumers, and others? Why is it that we, as a nation, could solve homelessness and food insecurity in weeks if there wasn't a need for someone to profit? We have the resources, the technology, hell - we have the agricultural and industrial might to feed and home every person in this country if we decided to. But we don't, because capitalism necessitates that there must always be a malnourished, underpaid, and underappreciated working class for the ruling class to exploit.
Anyways, it sucks that you have to take unpaid time off next week to give palliative care to your dying grandfather - I'll be more than happy to cover for you it's no problem.
A few easy, very agreeable tidbits.
"Instead of rich shareholders owning the company and hiring management to hire workers, you have workers owning the company and electing or hiring management directly. Within that system, there is as much diversity in views on governance as is here under capitalism."
"Instead of the government granting legal status to what we call a corporation and giving them the right to own property, we simply only grant that status to entities under the democratic ownership and control of the people who work there. Current zoning laws prevent you from putting an Arby's or strip mine in the center of your residential neighborhood. Zoning permits would similarly be used to assure that all workplaces are owned by the people."
"You can own all the property you want, but if other people work on that property, it is now legally regarded as owned by everyone working there or the public."
"Everyone who works for a company votes to either decide how to pay each other or the person or group of people who make those decisions."
"Communism doesn't necessitate a strong government, or even any government. America's strong ideals of individualism would likely squash tendencies towards authoritarianism, and any practical implementation here would likely be much more decentralized than most historical examples of socialist governments."
Don't be afraid to oversimplify things. When they inevitably ask about the details:
- Emphasize how much diversity of thought there is within communist ideology.
- Make sure they know there is a lot of choice within the implementation details, none of which are really more complex than the legal machinery that enable capitalism.
- Use that opportunity to explain the various sub-ideologies, showing that none of which are inherently about coercion or control. "x-ists would say that [thing] should be done by/through ... whereas y-ists would say that [thing] should be done by/through ...."
- Show that many of the ideas they value in liberalism like rule of law, separation of powers, or constitutionality would either be improved or made obsolete by a socialist economic system. Use whatever sub-ideology that best fits their value.
- Make things seem as mundane/tame as our current legal classifications. Speak in as few revolutionary terms as possible, and if you do, present them as how [historical figure] saw things. Revolution implies violence, which scares the fuck out of the libs. Presenting them as simple, minor classification issues simultaneously makes them seem quite achievable and also lets people build their own disdain at the system for being unwilling to make such minor changes...which will let them come to revolutionary terms without feeling coerced.
I'm more ML than ancom these days, but I will take whatever rhetorical position is best suited to harbor agreement and create an opening for acceptance of anti-capitalism/socialism. If you have to denounce the Soviet Union or CCP to win favor, do so. It's practically impossible to say "Everything you know about the rest of the world is the culmination of decades of propaganda. All of your worldview is bullshit and you've been accepting it as truth." You can focus on debunking MSM red scare bullshit on the real-world attempts at socialism only once they accept socialism/communism as theoretically sound.
If you can get them to look at links, send them this brief explainer on most terminology.
i find im able to slam rich people around pretty much anyone, although most people still have this crazy inability to make the last 20% of the connection.
Marx stuff combined with Bernie Sanders
hoooooooooooly shit
Fuck you, the way everyone is so hyper-critical online has been so annoying to me lately. Every single earnest post attracts a swarm of intellectuals ready to condescend. The reality is though, marxist-sandersism, or whatever I'm describing that you're laughing at, is not a laughably shitty explanation, you're just being a dick. What would you say to the coworker after they accuse you of supporting Stalin? Say yes he's le epic and based? Yeah that'd be very normal and not laughably awkward in reality. Yes this was a wild overreaction but like I said I'm sick of everyone just cumming themselves at how clever they are for cringing and loling at everything earnest
oh no, I'm scared
Let's pause the roleplay. I think that maybe you should avoid speaking Russian before establishing a comfortable rapport.
If you have any questions don't be afraid to ask. I'm a communist.
That's a common misconception, actually! Two things: First, socialist states like the USSR and China get a lot of accusations of causing famine. And it's true that they both had major famines in their early years. What's important, though, is that famines were normal in those areas before the revolution. After the revolution, they had one major famine and then completely solved food insecurity issues. Today, China has some of the best food security in the world. Second, capitalism causes plenty of famines of its own. The Irish Potato famine happened because the British government exported food from Ireland to sell for a profit during a crop shortage. Today, enough food is produced to feed everyone in the world, but it's not profitable to give it to poor starving people.
'You probably will not be surprised to hear that the colonists starved. Men were unwilling to work to feed someone else’s children. Women were unwilling to cook for other women’s husbands. Fields lay largely untilled and unplanted.'
Starving yourself and your family to own... yourself and your family.
“Well, what I believe in is something called Marxism-Leninism. It is a marriage of both Marx and Lenin. It primarily advocates anti imperialism, anti capitalism, and economic and social justice.”
I will hold back on redpilling them on the benefits of Stalin and the PRC for a later date
Sure, he was. But how do you know for certain that’s the real reason why he shot Kennedy? I mean, the guy that shot Reagan did it to impress Jodie Foster. And because Oswald was murdered before he could testify, you can’t say for certain.
I wouldn’t give him the talk about why Lee Harvey Oswald was a heroic man and should be on every 20 dollar bill.
I mean, He was the most likely person to have done it. I don’t think that the grassy knoll theory is fully credible.
i wouldn't say it's very likely that he could have shot jfk from the 6th floor of the texas school book depository while eating lunch in the cafeteria at the same time
"Tell you what. If you can get 100 words down, on paper, without using the internet, explaining how "China Bad" and "Stalin Bad" are effective retorts that disprove dialectical materialism and render the entire concept of Communism null and void, then I will stop being a Communist."
I just had a dream last night that my sister was watching a documentary on the soviet union and basically had this conversation. It didn't go well.
What I consider to be necessary for a communist government is largely just a communal concern for well being, both ours and everyone else.
At the expense of being called a revisionist, I actually disagree that this is necessary. Too many people are self-centered assholes to make this a requirement for our movement. We will need quite a few self-centered assholes if we want any chance at succeeding. You just need to convince them that our goals are good for their goals. If they aren't upper management or a business owner, it isn't all that difficult.
It's quite easy to frame things in an individual perspective. "YOU should get the full benefits of YOUR work. Rich assholes who don't give a fuck about YOU are basically stealing what you make."
Just reframe "taxation is theft" into "profit is theft". The tragedy of the commons just needs to be presented as "how greedy elites are fucking people like you and me over"
Them: Would you like the standard wash or the wash plus undercarriage
Me: I'm a communist
Them: Do you know how fast you were going back there?
Me: I'm a communist
Them: Help, my baby's carriage is rolling into traffic!
Me: I'm a communist
Them: I have been alone on this island for 15 years. Are you real or am I imagining rescue again?
Me: I'm a communist
Them: I can't believe it you found a cure for COVID-19
Me: I'm a communist
while America jerks itself off about how "free" it is, there are still plenty of legal restrictions on Communist Party members on the books from the McCarthy era
ineligibility for a bunch of jobs, registration acts, communist control act of 1954, etc.
That law has never been enforced and was ruled as unconstitutional in a lower court, but it has never been repealed and hasn't been ruled upon by the Supreme Court so by technicality in the United States it is still illegal to engage in pro-Communist activism.
I've done this, but when I end up getting into debates about it with lib friends, I find myself flat-footed because I usually end up either having to explain in detail how my ideal society would work or to argue about history that I typically don't know all that well (which of course tends to bring in lots of Western anti-communist propaganda, and without a strong grounding in the details of the history I can't easily push back on it). So my goal is to get better-versed in theory and history so I can actually defend my views adequately.
Why do they get to the be the ones shocked and appalled? They definitely know less than you and have much poorer political literacy. They react to your ideology in disgust instead of comfortably engaging with it only because their worldview is sanctioned and yours is demonized. Ignore this and then you are on equal footing; don't start from a position of the defensive outcast.
If it is a very negative reaction ask them why they don't like communism. "What do you think communism is? What does a communist believe?" Americans are really well programmed with thought-stopping ideas about communism e.g. "everyone the same" but they often lack even an rudimentary definition of it, so asking this can prompt original thinking. Or, ideally, ask them what they believe, how they think we should design society. Most won't have any sort of coherent answer to big picture questions, so you can ask about their current political concerns. This lets you know what they care about. Agree with them, amplify, explain how capitalism shits on these values and how your reorganization of society would help.
You must always choose between subtle listening and agitation and outright embracing communism.
Once you're openly a commie, closed-minded people will shut their ears, and you lose the benefit of the doubt with intentionality when listening to someone's concerns.
Choose based on the circumstances and your own rhetorical strengths.
Many people are very intrigued by the open embrace of communism. These are my favorite targets because I can be more authentic. Plus, they're usually more willing to entertain theoretical talk. I find it easier to destroy belief in an overarching, abstract system (capitalism) than a bunch of smaller issues then have to connect them.
But understand that people do talk, so don't necessarily out yourself in an environment where listening and agitation would be more suitable.
This is all around great advice. If someone reacts with shock, disgust, or scorn, always ask them pointed questions to get a grasp on what they think words mean. Then it puts the ball back in your court where you can correct their definitions, and show that your definition is not worthy of their reaction.
Or, ideally, ask them what they believe, how they think we should design society. Most won’t have any sort of coherent answer to big picture questions, so you can ask about their current political concerns. This lets you know what they care about. Agree with them, amplify, explain how capitalism shits on these values and how your reorganization of society would help.
Perfectly said. Asking about their ideals gives you hints on how to frame your own views to them. Rule number one should always be to find out what a person values. It should be your first goal. Once you have that, you just have to work to dislodge capitalism (and it's ideologies) from being the closest system to satisfying those ideals.
This should also be done with questions. You can dismantle someone's views by forcing them to rectify them with ideas & ideals they value more. They want to justify their beliefs, give them a challenging enough question or paradox, and they'll bend over backwards trying to mend two incompatible things, and destroy their confidence in that belief in the process.
Ex: Freedom
If someone highly values individual freedom, ask how a few people dictating what happens where people spend 8 hours a day than the people who work there making decisions together. Ask how the "freedom" to not have your Facebook posts removed is more freedom than having the financial stability to choose where you actually want to live or visit. Are you more free buying a car, spending money on fueling/maintaining it only to be stuck in traffic for hours a day or having a tiny fraction of that money withheld to build a rail system where you have another 90 minutes every day to do what you want with?
Always ask questions, express sentiment that you value their thoughts and input, and always pepper in lil "hmmm I've never thought about X from that perspective" type statements.
Well, I don't really see these people too often these days, so I'm not really going for conversion. Plus, the conversation starts with them seeking to understand my views, and typically becomes a debate when they take issue with something I say. When I'm going for conversion I typically don't come right out and say I'm a communist; instead I just make individual points about how capitalism is fucked up and let things evolve from there (this worked on at least one co-worker).
meeting them at their beliefs is absolutely the way to go. If you start off with "im communist" you're immediately on the defensive footing, having to defend your position while they mouth off over a century of propaganda. If you're new to talking about that stuff that might be fun, but after hearing "muh animal farm," "human nature," and "100 gorillion dead" you get really fucking tired of debunking it. If you engage them with the things they believe in, and then bring them out to their logical conclusions, you will have MUCH more success.
Radicalizing people isn't immediate, but you're most successful when you explain how the issues people care about all end up pointing back to the failures of capitalism. It's not a one time thing either. When people ask about what you believe in, be open about it. When they ask good faith questions, answer them to the best of your ability. It's ok to say that you don't know - but then you should go find out and learn so that you get a better understanding, and are able to explain it the next time you see that question.
Most people can sense something is wrong with the way the world is. The only answers to why are given by communism and fascism, and one is obviously superior to the other.
However, If someone is engaging in bad faith argument and just trying to waste your time, or trying to say that you're a communist so they can go "muh look at crazy commie!!!!", then just send them pig poop balls and dunk on them until you're bored or they go away.
I find myself flat-footed because I usually end up either having to explain in detail how my ideal society would work
A lot like this society but politicians actually do what people want because they're accountable to worker councils and I don't spend 8 hours a day living in a dictatorship.
Out of character -- I don't recommend going into detail about utopian communism. Talk about the society you'll actually live in, not the utopian ideal we seek to achieve. We'll be gone before communism is actually achieved, we should talk about the real society that people will live under, the practical future.
Don't argue with people about history. Ask them about their lives, find the things that are fucked in their life and relate it to how the rich are stealing from them. Don't try to sell them communism itself as you'll hit a brick wall, agitate around the exploitation in their lives, find things to empaphise with them on, find the broken things in their world and agree with them how messed up those things are. Relate those broken things to the enemy. Talk about workers and how they're a worker and how you're both the same, build class consciousness.
Some people respond well to theoretical arguments. Others definitely do not. Actual ancaps (as rare as they are these days) are the types that will respond well to the former.
Unless you're dealing with a Sanders stan, never focus on completely rewriting the system. Avoid revolutionary terms at all cost, especially for anyone older than like 30ish, as they'll want to avoid disrupting what little stability they've already achieved.
Most of the main ideas of a socialist economy can be accomplished with seemingly minor classification changes (with obviously huge implications). You can present this framework as a series of "shortest-path" alterations from a hypothetical standpoint. You'll inevitably get the "well how do we actually get there?", and that's when you give the "well there's a lot of different thoughts on that, none of which are easy." You can gain quite a lot from presenting big theoretical changes as humble changes presented humbly.
With most people, you should definitely focus on listening to their issues and agitation.
Don’t argue with people about history.
Agreed. Avoid history unless someone directly throws it upon you. It's too much work for not enough benefit. But you cannot always avoid it.
I like to respond to "but Stalin!!1" by painting Stalin as being (correctly) paranoid about their new, fragile system from being destroyed from both powerful people inside and much more potent exterior powers. Say the U.S. was a huge threat because they wanted to capitalize on their people, and without the largest institutional threat (the U.S.), Stalin wouldn't have been so paranoid.
It fits with my response to "socialism has never worked". I say "the United States is the only place that socialism can work because there is no United States to destroy or invade it"...Not 100% true, but it allows you to brush off a lot of propaganda baggage as aggressive U.S. foreign policy and it's role & effects. Also "China adopted a weird variant of capitalism so that the United States wouldn't focus on destroying it."
Ask them about their lives, find the things that are fucked in their life and relate it to how the rich are stealing from them. Don’t try to sell them communism itself as you’ll hit a brick wall, agitate around the exploitation in their lives, find things to empaphise with them on, find the broken things in their world and agree with them how messed up those things are. Relate those broken things to the enemy.
Be very careful with this. Nothing will hurt your efforts more than misrepresenting their work or their problems and trying to commandeer their legitimate issues for political gain. You really should make sure you have a grasp of what their problems actually are before you go about suggesting solutions. Listen closely, especially at first. This is great advice for those you work alongside or those whose work you have intimate knowledge of. Less so for people where you have a decent chance at offending via having ulterior motives about their closely held struggles. This advice is best for building issue-oriented organization vs radicalization.
Ask them about their lives, find the things that are fucked in their life and relate it to how the rich are stealing from them. Don’t try to sell them communism itself as you’ll hit a brick wall, agitate around the exploitation in their lives, find things to empaphise with them on, find the broken things in their world and agree with them how messed up those things are. Relate those broken things to the enemy.
Oh don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely not saying suggest solutions. I find a good approach here is to hear their problem then respond with "that reminds me of" an experience either yourself or "a friend" has had, tell that story. Then you use that story to direct aggression and blame towards the class enemy. This then isn't going to be taken as "you know nothing about me" or come up against personal walls people put up around their lives. It's about you or someone else but in context of conversation people link it to themselves by way of how it flowed there. When I've been salting this has been a common interaction I've had around workplaces, someone says a problem they have then some other worker is reminded of their problem or a friends problem and blames that problem on migrants or something -- the original person then relates the blame on migrants to their problem themselves. It never hits any walls in this way and this seems to be how these trends spread through the workforce.
Much of my work salting has used this tactic to agitate a workforce into anger at managers and owners. Agitating in this way is half of the battle.
Or you out punt your coverage and get accused of changing the topic too much because they are incapable of grasping the concept of intersectionality.
My go-to is "I like Bernie but he's a bit too right-wing for me"
I use Bernie as a bridge to bringing up the class nature of the Democratic Party, how the capitalists are hostile to even basic reforms, and why we need independent working class politics.
The problem with Bernie wasn’t just that he was too far to the right, but he was trying to push reforms in a political party that represents the class that is opposed to reforms.
Bernie Sanders is the fucking gift that keeps on giving, even if he is a lib.
- He did a lot to remove the dirt on socialism's name.
- He radicalized large portions of multiple generations.
- He's a living example of media corruption.
- He's a living example of DNC corruption.
- He outted all the shitstain capitalists pretending to give a fuck about anyone
- He exemplifies exactly how far the system is willing to go to stop even mild reforms.
- He lost twice. Never gets to fail to live up to the hype, serving as an unadulterated symbol of righteousness and a constant reminder of what could have been...making people look for other avenues for praxis.
Think about it. Would this forum even exist without Bernie? Likely not.
I disagree with him on a lot, but he's done as much as possible for the real left without getting his cranium blown off by the CIA. #1 lib for sure.
If I'm with friends I'll admit it. If it's chud co-workers I'll usually just say I want a world where everyone had food and a home no matter what. You sound like a dick to argue against that and it low key implies my leftism
Yeah I pretty much just tell people straight up yes I am a communist. If it were my choice I wouldn't have to charge you for this food and every person deserves to enjoy the fruits of industrialization and that we throw away almost half the food and clothes and shoes and stuff that we produce and that scarcity is largely artificially used to maximize profits. Be sure to also hit on the fact that 99% of crime is property crime that could be prevented without more police by just addressing people's material needs and conditions.
probably half of my shirts have some kind of leftist symbolism / slogan on them. the other half are punk band shirts that should give the same impression. leftist pins and patches on my bags and jacket. flags flying in windows. my tote bag for shopping.
no shame here
R e a l communists don't even breathe this bourgeois class-traitor people call air
I know this is a joke but there are some fashion worker co-ops iirc
https://sabcat.com/ are great. other than that really just buying from people who print their own stuff.
always looking for more if you have any recommendations
favourite to wear to family gatherings
thanks a lot I'll check that out, do you know of any that have plain shirts? I love their leftist prints but I can't wear them all the time safely so having ethically made plain clothes would be nice.
it'll be a cold day in hell before i fork out 20 bloody quid for a single sodding t-shirt
Be sure to mention you're a communist when doing based things like tipping 20%+, letting people merge, stopping for people crossing the street, picking up trash, etc. Don't mention you're a communist when doing bad things
I didn't bother reading your post sorry, just wanted to say that I'm a communist.
