This is a Dengist community in favor of Bashar al-Assad with no information that can lead to the arrest of Hillary Clinton, our fellow liberal and queen. This community is not ironic. We are Marxists-Leninists.
See this GitHub page for a collection of sources about socialism, imperialism, and other relevant topics.
This community is for posts about Marxism and geopolitics (including shitposts to some extent). Serious posts can be posted here or in /c/GenZhou. Reactionary or ultra-leftist cringe posts belong in /c/shitreactionariessay or /c/shitultrassay respectively.
We have a Matrix homeserver and a Matrix space. See this thread for more information. If you believe the server may be down, check the status on status.elara.ws.
Rules:
Welcome again to everybody, and happy anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of Vietnam . Make yourself at home and pay your respects to Ho Chi Minh. 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
Europeans are awfully loud about ICE and Trump while Frontex exists. Last week 380 people drowned in the Mediterranean.
The grim reality is that most politically active Westerners you see are just following social media trends. If Frontex was making headlines you'd see protests for it also.
Like the average politically minded person (Liberal, but most of Europeans who are politically active are libs) is operating at a level that if they see something on the News they think it's important, because it's on the News.
Have a good week, everyone! Remember that we live in an era of imperialist decline, where the international dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, the US Empire, is on its last legs.
As always, communism will win. We will win.
I think we are in an era of imperialist decline, but look, the Soviet Union said the same thing 40 years or so ago and everyone thought the defeat of the United States was inevitable. Seriously, people thought that back then; I read about it and it's astonishing. They were making a few similar arguments to today's arguments too.
We must NOT let our guard down for one second and press the attack forward while also not expecting China to swoop in and save us.
We should not let our guard down, no, but we do need to maintain revolutionary optimism.
Yes, that's true indeed.
It won't surprise any latino that has been abroad but as it turns out, the ICE goons that murdered Alex Pretti last names, allegedly, were Ochoa and Gutierrez. Gusanos being the boots on the ground for gringo fascists as always.
I’m officially done with Reddit. I’m sure I’m late to this party but apparently saying “I hope the flu finishes him [Mitch McConnell] off” is a threat of violence that is ban worthy
But people can post actual Nazi memes all over the site and its totally fine
Oh I recognize this style of moderation. Not punishing the hateful people but punishing the people who call out the hateful people. It's such backwards shit, but is probably intentional on some level since liberalism is more aligned with nazis and the like than they are anywhere near aligned with liberation. Liberalism loves to weaponize decorum selectively to punish people who try to speak truth to power.
I have been very loosely keeping up with the news these days, and have been skimming through the new Epstein stuff. It's got me wondering, has anyone here elaborated on why these files are being released to begin with?
If they have to release something, just to keep some sort of legitimacy, what is the benefit of releasing so many files?
I read that some of the files got taken down at some point, but why were they published in the first place?
If someone wrote a comment or post on this before, I'd appreciate a link.
So Tallinn was great despite the relentless cold. It was so cold that the sea froze for up to like 400 m off the coast so I got to walk across a frozen sea, which was dope. I visited a museum that had portraits of Lenin and Stalin to my surprise and it was 't overly negative of the Soviet Union.
I did notice that I got a lot of pro EU ads on my social media feed while being here so I wonder if the EU has got a campaign going over here. Lots of Ukraine flags everywhere too. The Russian embassy here was plastered with it. There was also a poster of the socialist heads with Putin next to it saying something like 'no more communism again' which was just hilariously shitty. I started to wonder if their support for Ukraine only comes from a deep hatred of Russians. Which is weird because like 1 in 4 people in Tallinn is Russian. Never heard this much Russian spoken anywhere.
(hypnotic voice) you WILL stop getting disappointed by impotent liberalism 2 minutes before bed <- speaking from experience
(edited comment bc it was silly nothingburger complaint)
(hypnotic voice) you will sleep at appropriate times
(comment was edited for similar reasons)
I recommend just using YouTube anonymously anyways.
I don't really know where to put this, it's tangential to the Epstein case. So I'm spoilering it, but feel free to remove it.
I just thought someone might want some ammo if they ever run int one of those people from the Baltics.
spoiler
The way American's talk about regime change is so insane. Random people with little to no geopolitical knowledge and absolutely no political experience, will flippantly say, "This is a great opportunity for regime change in Iran, we can't pass this up." Or, "I would love to see the Cuban regime toppled."
They talk as if they are strategizing military generals, in on the plan. Like bro, you are just some random American, how would any of this even benefit you?
Having a reasonable conversation on the topic can feel like a Sisyphean task.
It's literally all they talk about all the time in mainstream media, just drooling and drooling about regime change.
Billie Eilish dropping the US is a settler genocidal state on thr grammys was not on my bingo card but it is pleasant surprise.
oh i forgot last night :( HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF VIETNAM!!!
well, of course stuff’s been happening there with tô lâm + gaza 'board of peace' bullshit but let’s stay positive and focus on their history for bit. thank you for driving out the usamerican soldiers and winning, CPV! thank u for serving the vietnamese people. thank you, of course, to uncle ho chih minh for his socialist writings/legacy, one of the first revolutionaries who i felt great adoration for, who helped ease me into marxist-leninist theories—and let’s hope for some course correction in the new yr(?), vietnam :)
From Mexico! We keep raising our voice for our Venezuelan comrades!
learning about ukraine from non bourgeois western rags/corepig sources is so scary genuinely what the fuck. like what the fuck. this is a terrible war for all involved yes and i wish it wasn't happening and that it wasn't basically sending ukrainians off to die, but also, what the fuck? what the fuck??? keep in mind this is my first taste of just parsing the sources of the post on genzhou/death to nato (also seeing one blogger from russia i kept up with share posts about the topic/donbass) but like, what the fuck
I had a dream where Zelenski, frustrated with waning western support, went full mask off and did a nazi salute. It was only when I saw an article about him a few days later I realized this didn't actually happen.
🫵 You WILL have hope, comrade.
Pro-Elon Conservatives have officially lost their fucking mind. They're going all in on the "He's just autistic, he didn't know any better" excuse. As if he's not a grown man with over 10 children and mutiple wives.
The New Times cover:
spoiler
And what it should really look like:
Kinda crazy they're pushing for the reinstalling a monarchy and saying its for freedom, libs do know that the region, any really, monarchies are insanely oppressive yet they're cheering for one here? Also at this very conjunction where they got a masks off fascist regime!
because their entire opinion on Iran begins and ends with images like this:
lol but the same kind of photos about socialist afghanistan do not make em twitch.
you see that's different because it was imposed on them by the imperialist USSR or some other such horse shit
I'm having difficulty defending ML ideas when talking with people. The biggest issues being "if communism is so great why did it fail everywhere", "Communist were just authoritarian", "China is just as bad as the US". I just don't know how to defend these points properly tbh, I just don't present the ideas clearly enough.
They may be gish galloping you:
Gish gallop (sometimes gish gallop or Gish/gish galloping) refers to a rhetorical technique or strategy by which a debater puts forth too many false arguments for their opponent to be able to refute in the allotted amount of time.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/slang/gish-gallop
The important thing to remember is that outside of strict debate club rules or something, there aren't really any rules of debate. You aren't obligated to respond to any given claim/point a person makes, much less take it seriously. Some people will try to use this against you, as in, "You're ignoring what I said, you refuse to, blah blah" but too bad. They're just trying to get you to adhere to an invisible scheme of debate rules that are to their advantage.
So for example, when they say "if communism is so great why did it fail everywhere", you can shrug and continue to talk about ML ideas. Or you can go "idk what you're talking about. anyway..." Or you can flip it around on them and go "according to what sources? the nazis? or perhaps the people who were barely through with owning slaves when they started saying communism is evil?"
In other words, set the terms you are willing to tolerate. People like this are leveraging talking points they (usually) don't even understand that are designed to put you on the defensive for explaining things the average person would have a hard time being an expert in. So, figuratively speaking, recognize the CIA propagandist behind their words and argue with them rather than the propagandist.
I think one thing that helps is studying more yourself, and only speaking on subjects you're confident in your own understanding. For example:
if communism is so great why did it fail everywhere
By what metrics? Socialist China is rising rapidly, and socialist countries do better than peer countries when it comes to quality of life metrics like life expectancy, despite increased international strain. I also recommend reading about some of the problems with the USSR and how it was dissolved, so you can prove that it wasn't simply because they were socialist.
Communist were just authoritarian
Ask them to define this! What tends to help is highlighting how the communists, when in power, asserted the authority of the working classes. This is in stark contrast to capitalist systems, where capitalists assert authority.
China is just as bad as the US
Again, how? China has much higher approval rates, engages in win-win economic cooperation instead of naked imperialism, only has a couple overseas millitary bases while the US Empire has hundreds, and maintains a defensive millitary instead of offensive. Plenty to show!
People often focus on argument before becoming confident in study. The rest, like learning how to engage and reach people, comes with practice and time.
Communism didn't fail of its own accord, it was shot down, backstabbed and slaughtered by Western imperialists. No account of the failures of socialist governance is complete without acknowledgement of the wider context of the 'Cold' war and in particular US interventionism across the world post WW2.
I'll have refresh my knowledge on it, this is a good reminder.
Have a great week comrades!
Gotta love airplane travel and people who are sick but cannot be arsed to wear a mask for an hour or two because I will be spending my week sick
100 million views in 9 days. For comparison Japan's population is around 120 million
I have received a new job; very well-paying with great benefits. However, if you're a marxist, it really blows your mind.
They make medical devices. These medical devices cost roughly 20-30 dollars to manufacture; with the equipment being at most a half a decade old, already paid off. Each one of these medical devices can cost up to 200-500 dollars at purchase. There is legit just a 300-400 dollar profit margin on each medical device (over a thousand made and shipped a day) while people are getting paid 17-19 an hour.
Crazy stuff!
I feel like everyone (and maybe Marxists especially) should get a manufacturing job at one point to see how outrageous some companies' profit margins are. I used to be a carpenter making doors. I'd make probably around 8 or so doors and hour at 13 euro an hour. Each door would sell for around 300 euro. Sure, you need some wood for that but I'd guess the average door cost around 50 euro including salary to make. It's insanity to realize that for every 13 euro you receive you make the company like 1800 euro.
the classic "it would cost me an entire day's pay to buy one of the widgets that my line makes a thousand of an hour"
My Spanish is getting better every day, and I'm grateful for it. It's mainly because I'm consuming a lot of Spanish language content. I'm watching Pablo Escobar: el patrón del mal on Netflix (which is a good show), and get a lot of Spanish Instagram reels on my feed lately. And because of this, I catch myself thinking in Spanish more. The key to language learning is to expose yourself to the language daily. It's the same way a lot of us learned English.
Lately I got back into a video game, which did have one upside: I made some friends there.
The downside is it's a live service video game under late stage capitalism and that means it gets shittier with each update, but marketing presents it as an improvement (to be more specific, the updates are kind of like genie wish fulfillment, where like the players ask for a million bucks and they get crushed by a mass of deer). It's an (admittedly fucking tiresome) reminder that there is no real "escape" under capitalism. It is all an interconnected system. Can't just go off and chill for a while in an isolated part.
(Dutch) conspiracy nuts have been saying there is an elite group of people running human trafficking rings for their sick fantasies and I gotta admit they were right. Probably not about them being blood drinking reptiles but they sure as hell were right about some of the people involved lol.
I had a dream (literally) that I was talking to someone and saying how the financialization of the US is correlated with the rise in "influencers" who don't really do anything other than market product and opinions (or words to that effect). As dreams go, it may be one of the most coherent dream thoughts I've had and I'm like... "was I onto something??" Like I guess the general idea was this type of influencer role exemplifies the hollowness resulting from financialization.
It took me longer to take public transport home from Brussels to Antwerp (39 km) than to fly from Warsaw to Brussels, all the while paying the highest income tax in the world. For what exactly, I wonder?
