I tried reading manufacting consent and holy fuck I couldn't even go a few pages without having to look something up to even get close to understanding it. That said, I do get the overarching principle of it so I guess something sunk in. Currently, I'm flying through Understanding The World or something, a collection of speech from Chomsky. It's totally understandable, and even enjoyable to read. Another one that I havent got yet, but seem to like the look of is Capitalist Realism, it's only 90 pages.
Any suggestions?
Principles of Communism by Engels is by far the best, easiest to digest classic introduction to Marxist theory. It's done in basically an FAQ style.
Also Blackshirts and Reds by Parenti for history. Real short.
"What is now happening to Marx's theory has, in the course of history, happened repeatedly to the theories of revolutionary thinkers and leaders of oppressed classes fighting for emancipation. During the lifetime of great revolutionaries, the oppressing classes constantly hounded them, received their theories with the most savage malice, the most furious hatred and the most unscrupulous campaigns of lies and slander. After their death, attempts are made to convert them into harmless icons, to canonize them, so to say, and to hallow their names to a certain extent for the “consolation” of the oppressed classes and with the object of duping the latter, while at the same time robbing the revolutionary theory of its substance, blunting its revolutionary edge and vulgarizing it."
Astute young man that Lenin fella.
Someone recommended to me Cafiero's summary of Capital . Cafiero sent Marx two copies and Marx responded to Cafiero and said that it was a great summary of his ideas.
Engels also wrote a summary of Capital , the tone is drier but Engels is a clear writer.
There's a chance that was me actually. I had a different username on Reddit
State and Revolution reads like internet posts for me, I love it
The only theory I read are economics reports and centrist liberals' shit takes about things. That should be enough to radicalize just anybody
Yeah but I'm looking for solid talking points and a full enough understanding that I can teach people around me.
"We're losing 1.2M jobs a week, wealth for the bottom 90% of the country is in freefall, and Jeff Bezos just made $3B in a single day by selling his stock.... do you think it's appropriate that Congress allowed the unemployment benefits to expire when they approved nearly half a trillion dollars in corporate welfare without batting an eye?"
is a lot more relateable than:
"Imperialism--the era of bank capital, the era of gigantic capitalist monopolies, of the development of monopoly capitalism into state-monopoly capitalism--has clearly shown an unprecedented growth in its bureaucratic and military apparatus in connection with the intensification of repressive measures against the proletariat"
While both are true, one comes off as grounded in our tangible reality, while the second (Lenin) comes off as somewhat abstract and distant.
Graeber is very accessible
I've had great luck shilling Bullshit Jobs even in conversations with chuds who are talking shit about people with degrees.
"Yeah, and did you know the people with those degrees agree their jobs are bullshit, and this book proves it?"
Try to sneak up on them with this stuff.
Yep that's my favorite book to recommend to libs. It's the closest thing to "crypto-communism" I have seen. It's like Labor Theory masked in office drone cynicism.
Yeah libs for sure, too.
I can send them articles all day that spell out how shitty and counterproductive their PMC jobs are, but that's only going to alienate them and piss them off.
Easier and more effective to show them reasons for 1) why they're not alone, and 2) that it's not their fault.
That's what's so great about that book, it's not condescending it's just like "yeah this sucks for all of us"
If you want something economic focused, A Brief History of Neoliberalism provides a lot of graphs and figures to help illustrate how fucked neoliberalism really is. I successfully made a TPUSA guy question his ideology using it as a source
Capitalist Realism, Das Kapital for beginners, Inventing Reality
I enjoyed blackshirts and reds, and while it wasn’t incredibly dense or inscrutable, it probably isn’t quite “easy to read”
I would say it is quite an easy read. The language is mostly easy to understand, with maybe a few words (that likely reappear throughout the book) that someone needs to look up. The only issue I would have recommending it, would be if someone already has some knowledge about the history of communist countries or even European history in general, since there are chapters that feel a bit boring when they give a brief summary of history. Overall it is a good introductory book for anyone new to the topics, but also good to refresh your knowledge on a wide range of historic events.
Yeah, I look stuff up usually, and I go down random Wikipedia foxholes all the time because there's something I don't understand in one Wikipedia article. It just gets frustrating when I have to look stuff up multiple times on a single page, for 10 consecutive pages.
Did anyone save that list from the sub about theory for leftists who don't like to read?
Not pure theory per say but David Graeber’s writing is very approachable. He identifies as anarchist but the concepts he writes about should align with any good leftist and is even good for radicalizing normies.
Debt and Bullshit Jobs are his two big ones.
