I regularly see trots being memed about because "they do nothing apart from writing newspapers", but to me from their viewpoint (and as an anarchist) it totally makes sense and is a sympathetic view how it should be the workers leading the fight towards a revolution and the vanguard should stand aside and take the role of advisors (hence the newspapers) rather than leaders.
I feel like i'm missing something but i don't know what.
It isn't In fact, as a Luxemburgist, one of my critiques of Trots is that they want to maintain the hard control of a traditional Leninist party (which was, to be clear, the right choice for Russia and for China), rather than acknowledging the essential role and revolutionary potential of other leftist organisations in a developed, educated populace.
I'd like to note that "Trot" isn't even a useful term anymore, as neither the Sparts nor the Cliffites nor the other major factions resemble the late thought of Trotsky (Who unlike many trots I've had the pleasure of reading, smart guy with some pointed critique when he can stop being so butthurt.)
Hmm, that's interesting because my view on them is that they actually aren't that hard on control as Trotsky turned out to be in his own time.
Depends on the tendency. Cliffites are often almost councilcom, and are many New Left trots who took some Maoist thought. But others are more Orthodox ML.
It comes from Trotsky's critique of the nomenklatura, but he himself was always firm about direct Party control of the Soviets. Partially because Stalin opening up the party to his Soviet supporters was what doomed him.
Charitably Trotsky, and some Trot groups, are converging on a proto mass-line strategy here, but I've rarely seen it properly cohere.