Where are you from?

I invite you to take a guess given the obvious context clues.

I am only speaking to what the manifesto was proposing and nothing more.

You're speaking to what you imagined it was proposing not at all what it actually proposed not to mind when you take into account the wider writings of both Marx and Engels (as is necessary to truly understand the pamphlet that the manifesto is) both consistently differentiate between the state as an instrument of class rule and what we would call the government as an institution providing a necessary function of administration in advanced societies.

While the merely repressive organs of the old governmental power were to be amputated, its legitimate functions were to be wrested from an authority usurping pre-eminence over society itself, and restored to the responsible agents of society itself."

— The Civil War in France

State interference in social relations becomes, in one domain after another, superfluous, and then dies out of itself; the government of persons is replaced by the administration of things, and by the conduct of processes of production. The state is not 'abolished'. It dies out.

— Anti Duhring

I am also certain that you can provide nothing to back up the one world government claim (unless you choose to cherry pick and misinterpret harder than an evangelical) as it is simply not a position that Marx Engels or even any later Marxists have ever advocated for.

Really unnecessarily aggressive for not being able to piece together the blatantly obvious fact I'm Chinese. No wonder your understanding of Marx is so poor if you can't even manage this. Also what wall of text? It's a sentence, a short paragraph, and 2 quotes if that's a wall of text in your eyes it again speaks to your reading capability (or more importantly lack there of) and really demystifies how you could arrive at the completely nonsensical "understanding" you did.

Marx Engels or even any later Marxists have ever advocated for.

Marx, Engels, or even any later Marxists have ever advocated for.*

My apologies for not having perfect punctuation but your reading comprehension is truly abysmal.

Yes you are actually worse than the average Redditor was in my experience all the arrogance and somehow even less capable and intelligent (truly a spectacular feat I am very impressed).

Wow and now onto dehumanising me about... AI? What the fuck does AI have to do with anything?

Dude, tried to give this a second chance, but you fucks are just regurgitating AI while accusing me of doing the same, with no fucking point.

Entirely untrue but if it makes you feel better about your self you can feel free to believe it. Also no one accused you of using ai? Are you hallucinating? You were accused of being arrogant, unintelligent and there was an implication of you being annasshole (which I feel is quite accurate given the crash out) nothing about ai that's all you.

Spend all the money that you would inherit to pretend to be smart. Fuck all social media.

This is just a nonsense random non sequitur.

In reality, I am actually a rather nice guy, and I buy dinners for the homeless.

Hard to believe given you've been nothing but artogant and an asshole this entire time, but even if true so what? Do you want a standing ovation for doing the bare minimum of allegedly having human decency?

This was supposed to be a network that would protect against bots. And now we have meat puppets

More dehumanising nonsense fantasies so you can shield yourself from the fact that you are as unintelligent as you are arrogant.

Great rec!

I’d say that Das Kapital is more useful. The manifesto was a specific call to arms for a specific time. It’s worth understanding as a historical note, but, it’s not really a theoretical work.

Das Kapital, is a work about a theory of political economy and layed out the actual basis of Marxist theory.

Everything else is sort of down stream of that. At least in regards to understanding what specific objections or concerns people in Marxist thought have.

A few quick points:

1. None of it was satirical.

2. Marx claimed that he wasn't a Marxist as a response to those of his time labeling themselves Marxists. He still developed what became Marxism as an ideology.

3. The dictatorship of the proletariat isn't one person, but the absolute rule of the entire working class itself over capitalists. It's saying that workers run the world, not capitalists, ever again, and that when there are no capitalists all workers will simply be people, a classless society.

You’d think, but no. This may be the dumbest, most confidently incorrect Lemmy user yet.

Yes, an education is worthwhile. Read many philosophies inluding Marx, Hegel, Kant, Locke, John Stuart Mill, Adam Smith, Kropotkin, Stirner, Rudolf Rocker, Graeber etc. Though not my career, I keep studying for fun.

As with The Bible, there is a clergy surrounding philosophical figures. You may join their congregation. I choose not to partake. Read The Bible to understand society, but you don't need to join the congregation.

Yes. If I may, I would suggest "The origins of family and private property" from Engels. It's not explicitly political, but I find it serves excellently for dissolving some biases towards historical conditions and how they shape the current affairs.

Wow, i will check it out, thanks

No problem! Feel free to leave any comments or questions you may have if you choose the reading list option. The Marxism portal approach should take around an hour for the whole thing (minus the mini reading list it also recommends) so that's also helpful if you just want to know the basics.

I feel like you should read anything that people find so polarizing and taboo. It's short and its pretty dang hard to disagree with.

*turns the page "You expect me to read more than one page worth of words? That's a biiiiggg stretch dude."

Lmao

Yes, you should. Reading something doesn't mean having to automatically agree with it, but it will broaden your perspective. Read it critically, engage with the arguments being made, and use them to test your own world view. See if the arguments make sense to you, and whether you have strong counter arguments of your own to the ones being made.

It's good, it's def on the list. You'll be surprised by how moderate-seeming of Reforms it actually calls for, while being a revolutionary program.

Also read "Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, Wage Labor and Capital, and Critique of the Gotha Program. State and Revolution by Lenin and Reform or Revolution by Luxemburg are other great foundational works.

This is a good theory foundation to begin reading socialist history books: Wretched of the Earth, Black Reconstruction in America, Hammer and Hoe, Black Jacobins, History of the German Revolution, History of the Russian Revolution, etc.,

Also big recommendation for Ten Days that Shook the World by Jack Reed, it's legit one of the most exciting books you'll ever come across. It's better than any action fiction book, and it's just straight journalism of the actual October Russian revolution.

If you like podcasts, Mike Duncan's Revolutions podcast is pretty good, his last season on the Russian revolution is a good primer for the years prior to the 1917 revolutions, and the first fiveish episodes are pretty good historical and theoretical primers on various revolutionary movements and theorists. Season 10 episodes 2 and 3 are about Marx and Engels specifically, and I know lots of people who had their eyes opened to M&E by these episodes. I think Duncan ends the series on a sour note wrt Lenin that lacks real complexity and depth, but those early episodes are pretty good as an entry-point to Marx&Engels and socialist theory.

I’d love to point out he said “how about animal farm”… No. 😅 I was recommending a good book.

Absolutely.

Fundamentally, only reading about ideas that you already agree with is bad for you. You will learn less about your beliefs than if you had read something that challenges your beliefs.

Let's say you're very pro-capitalist, and you want to know everything about capitalism, so you read Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. Great! You learned some things about the historical basis of your beliefs, and there's value in that. So then you read Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman. Okay! So you're tripling down on the same ideas. You probably already know most of those ideas, though, right? There will be some new stuff, but ultimately it's more of the same stuff you already know.

So you try some more recent authors, and give a shrug to Ayn Rand, and you give Lions and Scavengers a shot. And maybe you pick up a new thing or two. But mostly, it's the same ideas that you're already familiar with.

Do you know what none of these books have? An angle of critique (except Smith, sort of). They're all just listing all of the good things about capitalism, and they're not telling you the bad things. Do you believe that Capitalism is a perfect system to organize a nation's economic policy, with no flaws? No? Then you should be interested in someone who elaborates on some of the negative aspects of capitalism, and what can be done to address those flaws, right? Because if there are flaws, you want to know what they are, so they can be fixed, right?

That's why you should read Das Kapital.

What i mean is that those who say Communism fails because of "human nature" aren't exactly wrong, but fail to see that the vast majority of people are at least attempting to be "good." (at least in their own mind). That's why I always delineate that there is a difference between socialism and communism. Communism is like a duck and Socialism is like birds: All ducks are birds, but not all bird are ducks.

More than attempt, the socialist countries run by communist parties, the ones attempting to build towards communism, have been responsible for some of the most rapid improvements in living conditions in history. Socialism and communism aren't like birds and ducks, but more like a sprout and a tree. Socialism is a transitional process between capitalism and communism, where production and distribution are gradually collectivized into communism.

Yes, origin of the family is great. I read it as a teenager before any other socialist material and it was the first time in my life where I felt my worldview had been radically changed.

The Communist Manifesto details the natural rights of everyone to equality and shared prosperity.

I read it a long time ago, but my memory is that the Manifesto (and its writers in general) discard the idea of 'natural' rights, arguing that legal / moral principles arise from the economic conditions of the time.

Marxist Communism is a bit myopic as it really deals with factory work

Marx's biggest scientific contribution is the development of a 'materialist' (here meaning 'physical') theory of history. I feel that his specific stages are too eurocentric, but the general principles are universal.

The Manifesto is a call to action, so it is somewhat simplified theoretically and deals specifically with the issues and conditions of the time.

I've always seen the end state as too difficult to stabilize. Mixed systems where Socialist ideals keep capitalist ones in check seem to work best long term because it satisfies natural human ambition without allowing the monied interests to acquire to much social and political power. (the New Deal, Nordic model)

Under most communist systems, especially in democratic societies, ironically, the proletariat still lacks true power as the operators of the means of production (the foreman or the managers) end up also being the leaders of the government. This is no different than oligarchy, just inversed.

In a proper system, there should be a separation of business and state just as there is a separation of church and state; for precisely the same reason.

The manifesto of the communist party is not a huge theoretical foundational text. E: It's a pamphlet similar to the programs of political parties nowadys. It's like 20 pages, not really for deep study.

If you're interested in marxist theory I would suggest reading modern Marxists like Slavoj Žižek. It's much more useful than reading actual marxist theory which is pretty dry and whose ideas have been adopted by various disciplines such as economics, history and philosophy already so they might not be as new and interesting as they were in the 19th century.

Maybe something like "Democracy in What State?" from 2011, you can just search for it on AA.

Yo Cowbee 👋. I was speaking more generally, if I'm being honest referencing a funny meme I remembered that went like

"My cat after a nap | Greek Philosophy"

"Oo biiiiiig stretch" 😂

I'll fully admit right away you're more studied on all things communist-theory than I, but if you want my opinion, I think the always-controversial "Dictatorship of the Proletariat" phase was a reach that seemed to say "This is a really difficult problem and idk it's the best I've got right now. Ship it!"

I understand he was being somewhat poetic with his word usage, but even then I think he had to have understood not only how easily that could be misinterpreted, but also how much the mechanics of it relies on perfect variables, like a grand unified revolutionary worker class that are all aligned for the common good.

I mean hey, I'm a Christian Anarchist personally. Will I get to see that society where everyone loves thy neighbor and mutually cooperates in love? Probably not in this mortal lifetime, but I think it's a great goal to strive for. So I'm no stranger to lofty ideals! Haha.

But as we've seen, revolutions are messy, and Marx's words often got heavily twisted to justify a new ruling party that says "Now WE get to wear the boot!" Who have no interest in a fair society once they get to live in the palace and make the rules.

From a purely poly-sci perspective, I think this is where the USA's founders were brilliant, in setting up 3 branches of government chosen by and consisting of The People, whose job it was to look over the others and say "HEY, that's not what we're doing here. No king stuff. Cut it out."

...of course, that quickly went to crap when the 2 party system happened. But at its core, I still think it was a good idea. (Minus the "people" being landowners only thing.)

But I don't entirely blame Marx over it:
It seems humanity will always have a percentage of shamelessly sociopathic grifters who crave control, and large groups of distractable followers who just want to be told what to think to avoid responsibility for thinking for themselves.

This is a HARD problem to solve.

When the first gets overwhelming access to sway the second, even the best devised political systems will come under immense strain. (Modern example: Facebook)

So I guess I just saw it as a bit of a stretch that he assumed the Proles would majority unite in each others' favor to suppress the tyranny of the ruling class, as exciting as it would be. I'm sure even back then, the working class has a bit of an infighting problem.

Sorry I could usually be a LOT better with words, but, as a working class myself without ownership of land nor meaningful means of production. . . I'm kept quite busy. 😂 Thanks for hearing me out in any case!

The Nordic Model isn't "socialist ideals" keeping "capitalism in check," it's welfare capitalism using the spoils of imperialism to placate the working classes. As it is a capitalist system, it has structural contradictions that run into boom and bust, crises of profitability, and problems like the tendency for the rate of profit to fall. This is all not to even speak of imperialism, which is where these social democracies rely on.

The proletariat is in power in socialist countries run by communist parties. You are treating job positions as though they are classes, but that's not how Marxists see class. Class is a relation to ownership of the means of production, not simply a managerial position being a class.

There is no hard line between church and state, or business and state. Interconnection exists between all things. The idea that businesses are free and independent really means that the state does not interfere in their ability to run, only in protecting them.

The biggest problem I have with your analysis here is the idea that communist parties are simply a new boot, so to speak. The idea that any group that successfully gains political power, no matter the class character, will turn evil and start doing evil things regardless of the economic formation is a defeatist lie told to make the working classes fear socialism. Socialist countries have historically been tremendously progressive for the working classes, and they all have working class parties at the helm. This is really just workers getting organized.

As for the US constitution, it was written of, by, and for the historical equivalent of billionaires. The progressive language betrayed the actual intent: create a stable shell by which capital would forever dictate the lives of the people. George Washington, for example, was one of the wealthiest slavers in the entire colonial society. They fought Britain both for taxation, and because Britain was posturing about banning slavery and banning expanding settler-colonialism, which the Iroquois people supported (which is why George Washington sent his army to commit genocide). This wasn't because Britain was good, but because they had their own class interests opposed to the colonies.

My point here is that the US constitution is a bourgeois constitution through and through. Why not skim through the USSR's 1936 constitution?