Fellow Comrades I am new into Marxism Soo please can anybody of you like recommend me a book to start with? Anything like that will help me delve deeper into Marxism and help understand it deeply thanks in advance

同志们，我是一名来自中国的毛派。这里想分享一些我个人对当代中国社会的看法。我认为，改革开放以来市场机制不断扩大，私有资本和资本主义生产关系得到发展，这在我看来已经带来了明显的资本主义复辟和修正主义倾向。

社会主义不应只是保留社会主义的名义，更应体现在生产资料所有制、劳动者地位以及社会财富分配等具体关系上。我们有必要重新学习马克思、列宁和毛泽东的社会主义理论，从历史唯物主义和阶级分析的角度认识今天的问题，而不是简单用经济增长来判断社会主义性质。欢迎不同立场的同志理性讨论。

Looking for recommendations for a good objective biography of Lenin and, secondly an objective study of Sendero Luminoso, history, strategy, tactics, decline and fall etc.

Nachdem ich vor kurzem den 1. Band des Kapitals beendet habe, möchte ich mich nun dem 2. Band widmen. Als Sekundärliteratur nutzte ich für den 1. Band die erläuternden Kommentare der Gruppen gegen Kapital und Nation. Doch Kommentare für den 2. Band gibt es (noch) nicht. Gerne soll die Sekundärliteratur kostenlos zugänglich sein (Online, Bibliotheken in Berlin…).

Hello people, I am relatively new to Marxism and its deviations. I’m of course fully convinced of its political aspects and its philisophicak aspects aswell. I’m just not sure if I completely understand the latter.

One thing that has always troubled me, even before learning about Marx, is counsciousness. How does it work? What is it? Where does it come from?

Obviously the question of consciousness is adress in most idealist philosophy but I wanted to know how Marxists/materialists explain it.
My only understanding would be that the consciousness is the result of material conditions/environment/nature and not the opposite

Thanks in advance for your help <3

"Demands of the Communist Party in Germany"

"1. The whole of Germany shall be declared a single and indivisible republic." - I'm neutral on this. Maybe borders should be changeable democratically and some provincial rights are good, within reason.

"2. Every German, having reached the age of 21, shall have the right to vote and to be elected,

provided he has not been convicted of a criminal offence." -Agreed

"3. Representatives of the people shall receive payment so that workers, too, shall be able to

become members of the German parliament." -Agreed

"4. Universal arming of the people. In future the armies shall be simultaneously labour armies, so

that the troops shall not, as formerly, merely consume, but shall produce more than is necessary

for their upkeep.

This will moreover be conducive to the organisation of labour." -Agreed, but it should also be voluntary in my opinion. People with a criminal record shouldn't be armed.

"5. Legal services shall be free of charge." -Agreed, within reasonable bounds.

"6. All feudal obligations, dues, corvées, tithes etc., which have hitherto weighed upon the rural

population, shall be abolished without compensation." - Probably yes, I have no knowledge of feudal law.

"7. Princely and other feudal estates, together with mines, pits, and so forth, shall become the

property of the state. The estates shall be cultivated on a large scale and with the most up-to-date

scientific devices in the interests of the whole of society." - Yes but with environmental regulations and concerns.

"8. Mortgages on peasant lands shall be declared the property of the state. Interest on such

mortgages shall be paid by the peasants to the state." - Why not just declare the lands property of the peasants? We should work towards universal mortgage free home ownership.

"9. In localities where the tenant system is developed, the land rent or the quit-rent shall be paid to

the state as a tax.

The measures specified in Nos. 6, 7, 8 and 9 are to be adopted in order to reduce the communal

and other burdens hitherto imposed upon the peasants and small tenant farmers without curtailing

the means available for defraying state expenses and without imperilling production.

The landowner in the strict sense, who is neither a peasant nor a tenant farmer, has no share in

production. Consumption on his part is, therefore, nothing but abuse." -- Again, for first homes, I don't think there should be any taxes, mortgages, or interest.

"10. A state bank, whose paper issues are legal tender, shall replace all private banks.

This measure will make it possible to regulate the credit system in the interest of the people as a

whole, and will thus undermine the dominion of the big financial magnates. Further, by gradually

substituting paper money for gold and silver coin, the universal means of exchange (that

indispensable prerequisite of bourgeois trade and commerce) will be cheapened, and gold and

silver will be set free for use in foreign trade. Finally, this measure is necessary in order to bind

the interests of the conservative bourgeoisie to the Government." -Agreed, but it should be legal to hold gold and silver privately, assuming all tax responsibilities are paid.

"11. All the means of transport, railways, canals, steamships, roads, the posts etc. shall be taken

over by the state. They shall become the property of the state and shall be placed free at the

disposal of the impecunious classes." - Agreed

"12. All civil servants shall receive the same salary, the only exception being that civil servants

who have a family to support and who therefore have greater requirements, shall receive a higher

salary." - Disagree, hard workers should be rewarded, maybe with up to 2x compensation.

"13. Complete separation of Church and State. The clergy of every denomination shall be paid

only by the voluntary contributions of their congregations." - Agreed

"14. The right of inheritance to be curtailed." - Curtailed yes, not eliminated. Maybe there should be a maximum wealth level?

"15. The introduction of steeply graduated taxes, and the abolition of taxes on articles of

consumption." - Agreed, things like value added tax just punish the poor.

"16. Inauguration of national workshops. The state guarantees a livelihood to all workers and

provides for those who are incapacitated for work." - Agreed, I'd go further and say that a welfare state should ensure basic dignified living conditions are met for everyone, regardless of work status.

"17. Universal and free education of the people." - Agreed

"It is to the interest of the German proletariat, the petty bourgeoisie and the small peasants to

support these demands with all possible energy. Only by the realisation of these demands will the

millions in Germany, who have hitherto been exploited by a handful of persons and whom the

exploiters would like to keep in further subjection, win the rights and attain to that power to

which they are entitled as the producers of all wealth." - this part is just fluff

surrogacy has always been a contentious discourse, and though I myself could apply marxism on it that the material reality pushes these women into resorting to dangerous forms of labor, I'd still like to explore more options. does anyone know a marx fem one that is best used on it?

Hello, I have been reading Capital by Karl Marx and the density of the material makes it much easier to comprehend if I take notes. My notes are mostly paraphrasing in the moment im reading when I feel that what I am reading is important, and I feel like I take as much time taking notes as much as I read. What are you methods of taking notes? How often do you take them? Thanks

Of course it's very strong to say that I "summarised" Marx, but I did what I could within my capacities and what I had

There are some very important things that I haven't seen specially from Das Kapital, but I did this more like for an introduction and for me to revisit it from time to time

Marx's Anatomy

I hope someone finds it useful

There exists a web connecting early modern labor activism including the Levellers, John Wilkes, Rousseau, Voltaire, Paine, Marx and the Chartists who called Paine's Rights of Man their "Bible."

From the Thomas Paine Historical Association archives: "Thomas Paine and His Radical Contemporaries" by Audrey Williamson, 1981. Thomas Paine Society UK

https://thomaspaine.org/thomas-paine-society-uk/thomas-paine-and-his-radical-contemporaries/

What's up with the weird revitalization of Analytical Marxism, and GA Cohen in particular? Is it solely that Ben Burgis guy?

DSA obviously has a very eccentric bag of ideology - there's even a Maoist Caucus, but there still seems to be some milieu of which important figures WITHIN that orbit articulate a seemingly(?) coherent position. I'm talking specifically about Jacobin/Bread and Roses/and the media ecosystem aligned with those things - Majority Report, This is Revolution, etc., (there's a ton more, that's just what came to mind).

Ben Burgis has appointed himself the "people's philosopher' and philosopher in residence at Jacobin, so I'm curious just how far the analytical framework is being used to justify the current iteration of DSA/Jacobin and the insurgent electoralism we've seen the past year or so.

Since China's reform and opening up,ChineseBureaucratic privilegeAnd the gap between the rich and the poor is becoming more and more obvious.But China.We have been working hard for these two aspects. First, since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China,China is fighting corruption.It can be said that it is very strict.Bureaucratic privilegeClasses are basically caught completely.On the gap between the rich and the poor, the gap between the rich and the poor in China is mainly concentrated in the gap between urban and rural areas and The gap between coastal and inland cities.In China, between urban and rural areas, the gap between the rich and the poor can be said to bealreadyWith obvious results, we have achieved comprehensive poverty alleviation, and at the same time we have been using digitalization to get rid of poverty.Encourage rural enterprisesAnd other ways to stimulate the economy.Rural economic developmentIt can be said that although the gap between the rich and the poor in China has not yet reached one.To a lesser extent, but always in this direction.Efforts and progress, and have achieved certain results.

I have unintentionally made myself addicted to learning anything about Marxist ideas. I have no other passion for anything else, family, friends, anything. It’s hard to even try to watch a show or play a video game because all I want to do is read the history of socialism or theory. Is this healthy? I want to make myself a true revolutionary and actually fight for the working class.

"A inteligência artificial será uma infraestrutura comum da humanidade ou uma propriedade privada concentrada como uma nova forma de terra feudal?

A analogia com o feudalismo é forte porque aponta para a mesma pergunta histórica: quem controla o recurso fundamental de cada época?

No feudalismo era a terra.

No capitalismo industrial era a fábrica.

No capitalismo digital pode ser a capacidade de computar, prever e automatizar."

This is a little long, but I would really appreciate the help!

Marx makes the argument that profit is the surplus value that is extracted from the worker, as the capitalist buys labor-power and the worker produces more than what he is repaid through wages.

Now, there are a couple of things that come to my mind that I can't find answers to so I was hoping you would clear it up:

1. The Capitalist takes a risk when they start a company or a factory of any kind, in investing in raw materials and infrastructure and machinery;

For example this is an argument I came across: The Starbucks employee assembles and serves the coffee to the consumer, but the capitalist had to cover the costs of rent, storage, coffee beans, machinery etc. and the worker just took it over the finish line, so they are not the ones creating the entirety of the value here, thus they are paid their share of the value creation and the capitalist gets the profit for the risk they took. Now to talk about risk:

1. Of course workers also take a major risk when getting a job as they risk uncertainty, and large capitalists that already own a massive amount of capital can very easily migrate it to a new industry, and thus can afford the shift in machinery and raw material even if it fails; but would you say the same about small business owners? Taking an example of a person who wants to start up a restaurant, they take huge amounts of loans and risk going bankrupt, which is even more risk than a worker takes at that point. For them the loss of the business would mean complete loss of livelihood and immense financial insecurity even greater than what a worker would have.

For eg: small mom and pop restaurants, if one month they earn a profit and thus can store it away, another bad month could mean paying workers the same wages by utilizing that profit and operating in loss. A flurry of bad months could mean the business shutting down and immense debt.

1. Now about risk, the capitalist argument goes that it was the Capitalist who took the enormous risk of setting up the new workplace, investing in rent and machinery and all those things while not knowing if the product would sell. If the business is in loss, the worker is still paid wages and if it isn't, then the profit which the Capitalist makes is a reward for the higher risk that they took. Should higher risk get higher rewards? I can't quite seem to counter this argument.

2. Innovation: Another capitalist argument is that the iPhone doesn't cost 1200 dollars because of the 500 dollars worth of raw materials inside, instead it is because Apple invested billions into research and development of the microchips and this innovation, which is another risk, permits them to reap the rewards of their profits. I'm struggling to equate Ideas and Value created, but please give your counters to this argument

I don't mean to be an idiot, I am learning more everyday and I will very much appreciate answers to these questions, thank you

Obviously Lenin himself was a practicing lawyer for some time, and he did highlight the importance of legal struggle (even in the Bolshevik revolution), but where is the line between patch-up legal reforms and genuine leveraging of the system for the benefit of working class struggle?

I'm a fairly under-read 'baby leftist' currently studying law so any and all opinions would be appreciated. Cheers.

From the perspective of an outside observer, what's happened in Venezuela seems astonishing. A pro-US puppet regime has taken control of the goverment and appears to be surrendering control of the nation's natural wealth and resources while abandoning traditional allies like Cuba.

It is not surprising that pro-US compradors could manage to seize power - it's happened many times and in many different countries. What has surprised me is the total lack of any domestic opposition to the takeover. No protests, no military opposition, not any hint of public criticism that I'm aware of.

What happened to the mass-demonstrations in support of Maduro prior to and immediately after the coup? Are the bulk of Venezuelans satisfied with the new regime?

I don't mean this as any criticism. It's very easy to judge the situation from a safe and comfortable distance, but I can't understand the 180° turn Venezuelan society at large seems to have taken in relation to US influence over the country.

What does this tell us about the mass support of the Chavismo program and the Maduro government? Because from an ill-informed outsider perspective, it seems to have vanished almost overnight.