CleverOleg

Ever since the election, there seems to be a torrent of polling that shows Americans in their late teens and early twenties are fairly reactionary (young men overwhelmingly so). I’m old so I don’t know anyone IRL in that age bracket. But something about what the media has been claiming for months now doesn’t seem to sound right. Idk maybe it’s 100% true but it’s something I have a hard time taking the media’s word for. I know we have quite a few users here in that age bracket. What are your real-life experiences (i.e. not online) with this? Do you think this age demographic is actually trending reactionary?

(I do remember digging into the details of one poll, and while it seemed there was more affiliation with Republicans than previous, it also seemed like there were an also very large segment that were openly showing to be further left than the democrats? So maybe more reactionary sentiment but also more genuinely leftish sentiment?)

I am so conflict-avoidant that I’m now at the point that most people in my life don’t actually have any idea I’m even close to being a commie. I really want to start expressing myself more openly and honestly - especially since I feel like I’m actually harming my mental health by not saying how I feel - but I always feel held back. Any tips on improving this are appreciated.

As in our comrade Karl Liebknecht, co-founder of the KPD? All these years I’ve been saying “LEEB-necked”, two syllables. But the I heard Matt Christman say “Leeb-KUH-neck-et” (four syllables). And I realized I don’t really know why I was saying it like I was. Anyone know how to actually say it?

I identify differently depending on the context.

When around comrades, I will identify as a Marxist-Leninist, as this is the most precise definition of what I hold to. I generally don't use this other than around comrades because no one else has any idea of what it means.

If I'm around people who at least sort of know what Marxism is, I'll call myself a Marxist. But in my experience this is pretty rare. Or this is what I will default to around people who I know are leftist broadly. I feel like "Marxist" is accurate enough where getting into the details of M-L isn't really necessary.

But when I'm around most normies, I will identify as a socialist. I think it's accurate enough to convey to people who do not have a very developed political understanding what I hold to. "Socialist" at the same time conveys a commitment to radical change well beyond the current Republican/Democrat paradigm, while not, for example, putting my job in jeopardy if I call myself a socialist to co-workers.

So the obvious question is why I don't call myself a communist very often IRL, even though I am one. I have before and used it a bit interchangably with M-L among comrades, but I don't use it around people I don't know well and know they are down with it. What I have found with the people in my broader social circle is such a huge lack of political understanding that calling myself a communist only shuts people down. When it comes to Americans, I think it's easy to overestimate their political understanding. I used to think most Americans just think communism is when "everyone is equal". What I've found is worse than that: it's more like people just have this vague notion that "communism = evil". They have no idea what it's about other than decades of propaganda that just equates communism as the ideology of our enemies and those who want to destroy America. So to most Americans, a communist is just someone who is "very bad person" who wants to destroy America (I mean, death to Amerikkka of course, but it's so much more than that). My own parents just think that communism means atheism and can't explain it more than that.

I totally understand the idea that we shouldn't shy away from calling ourselves communists. We need to normalize the idea because communism specifically is what's needed to save the planet. But idk, at this time and place in the US it feels like trying to do this just closes more doors than it opens, at least with the politically ignorant (most people).

I’ve tried to educate myself more about Palestine, decolonization, and the one-state solution over the last year and a half. It seems intuitive to me that ethnostates should not exist and that no, it’s not valid to carve out a land for the exclusive use of a certain people (especially but not exclusively when someone else is already there). So it’s not just about Palestine, but also about places that seek balkanization along ethnic or religious lines.

So while it’s intuitive to me, I realize that it’s not intuitive to nearly everyone around me (in the US, for reference). There seems to be this very pervasive understanding that of course the Jewish people should have their own exclusive land. Or that if two or more groups of people don’t like each other, it’s better to “divorce” and split up the country.

I struggle with explaining why all this is bad and not a real solution, though. Is there any more in-depth resources (books, articles, academic papers) that articulate a theory of why ethnostates are bad, and why splitting up places isn’t a solution?

It’s been long enough, I find myself really missing Matt’s voice. I never really followed his CushVlog - mostly because there was other stuff I wanted to get through when he was putting those out, and I’m also not great with sitting down and listening to YouTube videos.

So I’d like to watch some episodes, but I also don’t really want to slog through all of them. Do you all have any episodes that you like and can recommend?

I’m really trying to commit myself to getting a better understanding of the philosophical underpinnings of Marxism. I’m starting with the Vietnamese textbook on dialectical materialism that Luna Oi translated, before moving on to The Dialectics of Nature and Anti-Duhring.

My problem is I really struggle with philosophy. Marxian economics I can vibe with all day, but philosophy is something I’ve never been able to really get a hold of (but wanting to fix that).

So my first big struggle is understanding the difference between dialectical materialism and materialist dialectics. Is the former more of the worldview or viewpoint, and the later is more for explaining and analyzing specific processes? And if that understanding is correct, isn’t materialist dialectics the things we should be committing ourselves to as it’s what helps us better understand material reality (rather than dialectical materialism, which I guess would be more of a “belief statement?)? I don’t know I probably have a lot of this mixed up, just looking for any help on this I can get.

Just in case anyone else here is watching the match.

Of course it was that gusano Maria Salazar who introduced this bill.

Interesting to note that the text of the bill seems to focus on China and mentions Xinjiang in particular. Also how 1.5 billion people currently “suffer” under communism.

This actually seems like a bit of an own goal to me. Sure, tell a bunch of high school kids how China is an undemocratic totalitarian nightmare and that the Uighurs are currently having their organs harvested. Then those students can do literally 10 minutes of research to see that none of that is actually happening and that the people of China are pretty happy with the state of things (at least relative to US Americans).

I should point out for non-US Americans here, education in the US is decentralized. The federal government doesn’t actually have much authority. This bill just tells the Victims of Communism Memorial Fund (snicker) to create materials and make them available.

Death to America.

I think it’s remarkable just how comfortable white folks were to vote for an outright white supremacist. It’s important to note that while Duke did give some throwaway lines about how he became a born-again Christian and wasn’t racist anymore… I don’t think anyone believed him because everything else he promoted and advocated for was outright racist. Duke was nothing like Nick Fuentes or even Richard Spencer today - racists who trying and hide just how racist they are. Duke was literally a former KKK grand wizard and even though he was in his early 40s, he had a long track record of openly white supremacist comments. His campaign platform was still racist af and to the surprise of no one here, he got a solid majority of the white vote and only lost because of solid turnout of black voters who voted against him.

I was reading some comments on Reddit about this race and of course white people there try and justify it. A whole lot of “well most white folks didn’t agree with Duke but the other guy was just too corrupt”. Of course, white people are never just racists. As if people really care so much about corruption that they’re willing to vote for literally the worst person in the country. I honestly hate this attitude among white folks - this idea that you must NEVER assume someone’s just racist, and that you can make any excuse for their racist actions or comments by finding some other reason - any reason at all - for their racism.

Literally AmeriKKKa.

(Thanks to Gerald Horne and Tony on the Actually Existing Socialism podcast for making me aware of this)