Communism

In addition to this, one of the selling points of Parenti, Woolf, Hudson, Furr(?) is that they're accredited professionals. This isn't to take an elitist stance on my part. But it counts to the audience that must be reached.

There is an alternative, which is to develop working class education. For us and by us. Reading groups are good, but I'd argue that a fuller program and curriculum is needed. Some examples exist. But we need to get to the stage where they're in all our communities, wide-ranging, and not just online. Many people don't have basic literacy or numeracy skills, nevermind a theoretical understanding of political economy.

This goes back to my first point. It's not just that being well regarded academics means that people will listen. It's that well regarded academics are good at explaining things and teaching. I think that's why e.g. Parenti and Woolf are so effective.

I don't think simply making knowledge accessible in a bourgeois world will make people radical. The bourgeoisie control the means of distribution as well as production. Most people never encounter (1) counter narratives, or (2) encouragement to learn to think critically beyond a shallow liberal sense of the phrase.

Without these, most people aren't even aware (i) that a Marxist critique exists or (ii) what a Marxist critique can offer. This is what intellectual titans like parenti and Woolf provide. There are others, though, and more coming through every day.

I want to note that English-speaking people might be comfortable with applying "anti-authority" to everything due to their imperalist environment, but this causes a lack of awareness of socialist authorities that are in power, such as China. That is why it is important to move away from "anti-authority" to anti-capitalism.

I don't think my perspective on it is related to "anti-authorianism" but rather accessibility and the new media landscape. Parenti and Wolff are good writers and very useful too, but at the end of the day they write only in English and their target audience is mostly North American or European. They also have to work within the constraints of capitalist academia and publishing which makes it difficult for many worldwide to even read what they have to say (i.e. copyright laws). The old forms of media (books, newspapers, TV, radio) have a very high barrier for entry and are costly to propagate whereas on the Internet getting the points across is borderline free. That is not to say that there should be no authority, but rather that in a society that is now so dependent on crowd-sourced websites like Wikipedia, that authority can be less dependent on publishing deals and available for those who would otherwise not be able to read a book from an North American economist.

For instance, I had never heard of Parenti until 2 years ago due to him only writing in English, and that is similar for most of my third world colleagues, so I wouldn't say his authority extends that far into the world out there. This is why I jokingly said that Prolewiki is the next Marx, as most people now are on average actually literate enough to have reading binges on places like that and the MIA, if we put in the effort to develop and moderate it properly.

Marxism is doomed 😔

Came here to say Vijay as well even tho he's not that young he should have a good 20+ years in him still, hopefully.

IIRC Finkelstein had some dog shit takes about trans people recently, when he misses he misses hard.

I agree they have some good writers but all three publish so much anti-communist literature that it can be hard to sift the good from the bad. And it takes time reading the founding thinkers just to know what to look out for in left anti-communist literature.

But in terms of "folks I've been reading that seem to have decent takes:"

• Roderic Day of redsails.org has put out some really good pieces in my opinion.
• Peter Coffin has a mixture of good takes and bad ones. He's stubborn on holding onto transphobia -- or at least, transphobia-adjacent comments -- and his "LGBTQ+ is a bourgeois ideology" take, which, so far as I can tell, may be one of those "okay, 'technically correct' under your framing of it, but thoroughly counter-productive seeing as literally nobody else frames the issue in this way." Unfortunately, he's recommended stuff from PatSoc Caleb Maupin before too. Basically, I see potential in Coffin, clouded by problems.
• What I have read of Xi Jinping -- which isn't much -- has been solid.

So yeah, if you're looking for heroes, I wouldn't hold your breath. But there's life to be found in the world of Marxism.

I believe we will move towards a sort of “crowdsourced” theory where the main theoretical line is born organically out of continuos communication and discussion until we eventually get to a point where most contradictions and disagreements are solved.

Not if the CIA or FBI have anything to say about it. Hell not if Maoists and Trots still exist. Hell not if grifters still exist and wield enormous influence that trickles into and infects even those who condemn them on the whole.

This feels kind of like thinking along anarchist lines. That if we only allow everyone to do their thing, people will just arrive at the right conclusions. Even if all institutions sabotaging Marxism magically vanished tomorrow and everyone forgot they existed and their methods, there would still be problems with this. With them existing and those who benefit from them and replicate their suppression and division, this is a pipedream. There's a reason parties adopt a party line, and that's because you'll never get 100% agreement. The point of that of course being, disagree behind closed doors, discuss, debate, but then present a united front once dem-cent process is done whether you lose or win. However you'll always have haters, power-mongers, fed-plants, and people high on their own fumes.

We need a party, a real movement and leadership within that movement to begin to write down any worthwhile theory in the west. Moreover that movement has to have some sort of success beyond just being mildly popular as CPUSA was in the 30s. Theory without practical, proven application is just spitballing hypotheticals into the void and not necessarily worth a lot.

Also I'll offer a lot of the western left is infected, deeply with idealism, western nonsense thinking, etc. I think the worthwhile theory of our era is going to come out of China and be translated. At least until the west begins to crumble and a real movement that begins notching successes forms in the west. Until that point it's largely naval-gazing. The one thing we can try and do right now is solidarity, solidarity, solidarity with other nations and peoples. Anti-imperialism is the one litmus test, wishing for the defeat of the west to which we must hold ourselves and all who would call themselves Marxists who are not in fact vulgar perverters of that term. Ukraine has been helpful in this, weeding out those still clinging to the propaganda of empire and the bourgeoisie who benefit from it.

I agree the world has changed a lot with modern tech. And we should be utilising that. It does provide opportunities and it must be theorised, starting with analysis like yours. I do have some criticisms, though.

i just can’t see in the current world a russian revolution like scenario when whole shifts at factories would meet up to read Marx.

This is one of our tasks. It must be built. Reading and discussing key texts regularly and in a careful order must be part of a revolutionary organisation.

I believe we will move towards a sort of “crowdsourced” theory where the main theoretical line is born organically out of continuos communication and discussion until we eventually get to a point where most contradictions and disagreements are solved.

I agree but this is the task of a revolutionary party working with the people to develop a mass line. I'm unsure if it can arise spontaneously.

One of the key benefits of people like Parenti or Woolf is that due to their careers, they have the time to think, write, and publicise their ideas. That's hard for people with unrelated full time jobs. Although there is some good work by groups like Notes From Below (I'll get a link).

with time the community shaped itself to a point where we substantially agree with each other on pretty much everything.

That might be more because the patsocs, Hoxhaist, and liberals we're all expelled lol. (I'm joking, here. I agree with you though as I've changed my views on many topics since joining here. So the agreement isn't because there's no room for dissent.)

We need to make sure people without a "higher education" understand socialism and communism.