Welcome again to everybody. Make yourselves at home. In the time-honoured tradition of our group, here is the weekly discussion thread.
☭ Matrix homeserver and space
☭ Theory discussion group on /c/theory@lemmygrad.ml
☭ Find theory on ProleWiki, marxists.org, Anna’s Archive
Hi, I’m new here, and to introduce myself and contribute to the further development of the theory, I’m going to list the last two books I’ve read recently.
Truth and Knowledge - The Theory of Knowledge in Dialectical Materialism in the People’s Republic of China - Tchang En-tsé [Zhang Enci] (1976)
The book is written in Spanish, but it is one of those books that anyone interested in Marxism-Leninism and total liberation from capitalism should read. There are very few books that, even after you’ve grasped the essence of dialectical materialism, leave you speechless and allow you to delve even deeper into knowledge and objective truth. This book helped me fully understand the dialectical materialist theory of reflection, which, in my opinion, is the main cause of the mistakes made in various organizations around the world. How can we objectively grasp the objective reality of different countries? Through the central organ (objective truth) controlled by the party. In my opinion, this book helps us understand this issue better in philosophical terms.
https://archive.org/details/verdadyconocimento/mode/2up
Frederick Engels: Life and Work - Editorial Progreso, Moscow, (1987) spanish
This book helped me see Engels not as the bourgeois version that has survived to this day, the one who was merely an appendage to Marx, helping him finance his works, etc., but as a revolutionary with his own individuality who betrayed his class in the service of humanity’s complete emancipation. I learned that he spoke and wrote many languages, that he was an active participant in the 1848 revolution, fighting on the front lines and later fleeing the counterrevolution. There are many portraits, personal belongings, and drawings of him here that I had never seen before, and that surprised me greatly as well and the part of the book that recounts the struggle of the Paris Commune made me so sad that I almost shed tears over this quote from Marx, which seems particularly urgent to me in the times we live in:
“THE PRINCIPLES OF THE COMMUNE ARE ETERNAL AND CANNOT BE DESTROYED; THEY WILL REEMERGE TIME AND TIME AGAIN UNTIL THE WORKING CLASS ACHIEVES ITS EMANCIPATION.” C. MARX
https://archive.org/details/engels.-vida-y-actividad_202610/mode/2up
Lots of people really sleep on Engels. Its too bad Engelisim sounds like a medical condition.
I often think back about this book by William Blum, the one aptly titled Killing Hope. The book itself is, of course, excellent but it’s the title that captures my mind again and again. The US is effectively killing not just people but the very notion of hope.
Is Isaac Asimov’s Psychohistory similar to Historical Materialism?
I heard an anecdote that said he create historical materialism from first principles and shrugged. I don’t remember where I heard it.
The overall idea seems pretty similar although he claimed he wasn’t inspired by dia.mat. I guess in fairness historical materialism probably osmosed into culture quite a bit by then. In terms of actual method it is of course vastly different.
That’s interesting. I guess the method of diamat would eventually exist even without Marx if his inspiration wasn’t just cultural osmosis.
And the process of dialectical and historical materialism will inevitably lead to the understading that revolutionary socialist revolution is the inevitable end of capitalism. This is why Marxism is called Scientific Socialism.
Apparently the Green Party won a seat in the Hawaii senate
Good for them! Anything that takes seats away from the duopoly is good.
BREAKING NEWS:
LeBron James reportedly forgot to learn Dialectical Materialism before reading The Capital
This is why Kobe is my goat smh
Ah, Chairman Bryant
How often do you encounter the term USian irl? I feel like I mostly still only encounter the term American, but here and there I still see the term USian in the wild, so I feel the usage is growing.
not once
people just call them yankees, yanks, or americans
How do you pronounce it? is it like you-es-ian or is it like you-shan?
Literally never. But I live in America, so that’s probably par the course.
As an aside if we have to ditch “America”/“American” (which I’m fine with) can we use Yankee instead of USian/Statesian?
The invention of the latter is redundant when the former is older than the country itself. They also just sound awful in English; I’d much rather be called a Yank(ee).
The Sovietology reading group over on Hexbear was a tremendous success, and we will be continuing with Soviet Democracy by Pat Sloan. This was based on the early Soviet democratic model, and provides a fantastic look into how socialist society can integrate the people into the decision-making process, countering narratives of a shadowy party controlling everything from the top down. Sign up here, today!
Furthermore, we will be beginning a reading group for the basic Marxist-Leninist reading list I made! I highly recommend both those new to theory and those who are already familiar to join. I have included a mix of modern and classic works, many perspectives, and some lesser-known works. At the same time, it is not designed to be a compendium of everything esoteric and fringe, it’s designed to prepare you to join organizing efforts and equip you with the tools you need to excel in our shared struggle! Sign up here, today!
And thank you comrade Edie for running it!
the discussion group on /c/theory@lemmygrad.ml is on indefinite hiatus due to lack of engagement, so I’d encourage anyone who did want to join to try this instead
Thank you!
Glad ProleWiki is back up. I remember when they first started.
The Voice of a Communist.
The voice of a communist cannot be silenced,
Just like conscience, if it exists within a person.
One must simply be a communist,
Every moment, every day, always, forever.The voice of a communist is in their actions,
When they understand life and do not back down,
When you remain faithful, kind, and compassionate,
And carry the truth with all your strength.The voice of a communist does not choose times,
It doesn’t say that the time has not yet come.
It is an eternal endeavor, where vision is clear and the back is straight,
Where everyone stands up for others, bearing their own and others’ burdens.The voice of a communist is to fight without stopping,
To create every day for those who will follow you.
It is reconnaissance, attention, logic, understanding the meaning of the trick,
That tries to tell us that our “red” is no longer the same.The voice of a communist is our eternal banner of victory,
It is our truth and conscience, when you move forward with faith,
It is the eyes in the photograph of your grandmother, your grandfather,
And the understanding that you are not living in vain.Denis Chernov
❤️
From Venezuela, that awesome shirt translates to “the commune is young”
Thank you to everyone in the US who vote vote voted, it was your moment
Looks like brunch is back on the menu, boys!
So happy to start going to brunch with my besties (high level management coworkers)
you have saved the earth, now you can go enjoy brunch while the war keeps going on and literally nothing gets resolved.
Blue has won so everything is fine now
Here is my prediction: the current crop of “democratic socialist” socdems that were elected this year and that will be elected in 2028, 5-10 years from now will be the biggest warmongers and most fanatical advocates for regime change, color revolutions and pink-washed neocolonialism, as they realize that the social democratic welfare system they promised to protect and expand cannot be maintained in this terminal, moribund phase of capitalism and a de-industrializing imperal core without the plunder of the global south, whose slipping away from the imperial grasp they will seek to halt and reverse at all costs.
While I’m still holding out hope, I certainly wouldn’t be surprised if Abdul El-Sayed changes his name to Abdul El-AIPAC in a couple years time…
Israel has become too toxic, but the anti-Russia obsession is still very popular with the liberal base. The Dems will shift financial and military support from Israel to Nazi Ukraine and they will rebuild and hypercharge the USAID/NED machinery against Russia-China aligned global south countries.
dang if those are the socdems i wonder how the neocons gonna be
Neocons are dying out. When the boomer generation kicks the bucket they will have no more base of support. The new crop of imperialist warmongers who will replace them are the liberal interventionists, the “Slava Ukraine”, “free Hong Kong” libs and the “leftists” who signed the anti-Iran open letter, accused China of “cultural genocide”, and called Cuba and Venezuela “authoritarian dictatorships”.
Imagine how grateful everyone in Gaza and Cuba are feeling towards the brave USians right about now!
i feel like we’ve lived through this like 5 times in my very short life, how are boomers still so invested in this cycle lmao. blue maga straight up thinks they’re going to put Trump in jail and that sort of stuff 😂
people who feel like it may afford them the slimmest, meager relief or a little weight off the still present boot i understand, but people who think the dems are REALLLLY gonna get serious now and do the things they’ve imagined they promise (even an OUNCE of even DOMESTIC security is rarely even really on the table, if we actually observe what policy passes between the reds and blues) surprise me
complete lack of object permanence, it’s astounding
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I mean the democrats will do nothing with their majority. The PSL has gotten pretty decent numbers this year though. Almost 100,000 in Ohio.
I hope to see the PSL do pretty good during 2028. But in the meantime I do not understand all of the optimism from a blue wave
gonna be a scoop of “oh but trump just veto’d our legislations! wait till we get the presidency”. and when they get the presidency they’ll say “oh but republicans have the majority in senate, we can’t do anything!” etc…
I remembered Minecraft Story Mode today.
I was thinking about how the creator of the Wither Storm made a contigency potion in case he lost control of it. But even though the potion never gets used, I don’t think there was ANY chance of it working.
I have no evidence for this, but I don’t think the equivalent of a nuke could’ve been stopped so easily.
Minecraft has a Story Mode now?
it’s a separate game from Minecraft, made by telltale. it’s 11 years old already.
there’s a good chunk of ivor defenders (i think that’s his name) and i just wanna say. even if he had that untested potion the plan is still so dumb as to be evil
Ivor: Let me just create an entity using three skulls, sand from Hell, and a reality-warping command block for a petty revenge act. There is no way this is gonna go wrong!
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just going off the numbers, there’s huge swaths of the US population that do not care about the dems. 2020 was the highest-turnout election in a century or more. you know what the turnout was? 66.6%. highest turnout in a century and still, one third of the eligible US population did not vote. those who do show up for every election tend to be quite comfortable in the system as it stands. petty bourgeoisie, labor aristocracy, haute bourgeoisie. the communists are wasting a whole lot of time and energy on electoral stuff when the people who would even shake hands with a communist, the people without a vested interest in upholding imperialism, those people are statistically least likely to vote. if you only pay attention to the people who pay attention to the elections, you’re looking in the wrong direction. i hope that makes you feel better and not worse.
You aren’t a failed communist for feeling the way you do and you aren’t narcissistic for being open about it. Please get some food and be kind to yourself, comrade.
Is it correct to say that the USSR/Russian Federation has the highest Nazi kill count?
I don’t want to equate the two, but modern Russia kept the tradition of killing nazis going.
Dont let the two Ukraine fans on lemmy hear this lmao
The USSR killed 70-80% of the nazis that died in ww2.
