Ask Lemmygrad

Yesterday I found someone who says “question mark” after every question and has apparently forgotten how to inflect their voice to express tone. It was horrifying, but I realized I’m not that different. I immediately think “cringe” or “based” at many things. Even when I’m not terminally online everything I hear gets put on a meme template by my brain. I’m having trouble expressing tone/emotion in writing without visual indicators like emojis or “/s.” I know I’m not alone, what do we do?

Regardless of if it's practical to live that way in daily life, the world seems pretty determined. Everything happens because a vast amount of interactions between infinite factors causes it to. You can't really say you choose between things as many influences have been taken in by you and many things have affected your psychological state. Has everything been practically decided by the big bang? Now, this is not to say we can know everything or predict the future, but we know what's likely. Socialism or extinction may be inevitable, but we don't know yet. Socialism can only happen if people keep fighting, regardless. People will be convinced or principled or not. Science seems to agree with this, and only few, like the wrong Sartre would propose we have ultimate free will. So are there any arguments against determinism? I know there is a saying that you're freer when you recognize how your freedom is restricted, and that recognition may make your actions better, but isn't there ultimately no freedom?

Any help is much appreciated

(Sorry for any possible English mistake, I thought about this and wanted to read someone's idea on or against it but I can't find if there is a movement like it and what it would be called)

Like, we probably all agree that we are against capitalism but in order to achieve socialism (or directly communism) you must first develop the proletarian class as it is what is going to start the revolution.

So is there something like anarcho-communism, where they are opposed to having a socialist state as a way to develop communism, but that still believes in the importance of a socialist state in a utilitarian way to develop it's own group of revolutionaries ?

An idea according to which a socialist state will never achieve communism (for whatever reason, like the small difference between classes under socialism before it turns into communism that might become reactionaries and roll back change even under a dictatorship of the proletariat or something else) but there is going to be one more revolution starting from the (relative) bottom in the socialist state.

Because from my basic understanding of ML for example, the transition between socialism and communism is supposed to be smooth. But maybe I'm wrong ? Feel free to correct me on anything.

Last I’ve heard, there were some issues, but things were getting better. Now I have stumbled upon this headline and wish to know more details about the situation.

My hunch is yes, because of how successful English agrarian capitalism was early on... but likely more slowly?

I'm not Statesian (thank god!), but I've been paying some attention to Cornell West's campaign since he announced it.

He's not a Marxist, seems to be some kind of Christian socdem/demsoc, but I've noticed he's pretty willing to denounce US imperialism, structural racism and genocidal practices. He seems to have gained some repercussion recently due to his support for Palestine, and he also has a history of cooperating with American Indigenous groups.

I know that the PSL has also announced their candidates (though tbh I haven't heard much about them), but I want to start this discussion regarding the pragmatic decision to try and get West in one of the presidential debates.

I have no hopes of Statesians ever getting a Marxist from PSL there, but I think it's in the realm of possibilities to have a third-party socdem to attack the DemRep duopoly for the sole purpose of building distrust from the population in both parties.

What do y'all think, does West deserve a little bit of critical support?

According to Marxist historians writing on the origin of capitalism, namely Ellen Meiksin Wood (Origin of Capitalism) and Ian Angus (War Against the Commons), the first capitalism was defined by a particular triad arrangement: landlord, yeoman / capitalist tenant, and wage labourer.

Does anyone know good sources to particularly examine the circumstances and lives of each? Short little descriptions of the daily life of a landlord, capitalist tenant, and wage labourer in 1400s-1800s England?

Btw, I was taught Northanger Abbey for a class last year and I think I could pick any random character to get a depiction of the life of a landlord or hanger-on, just kidding, looking for non fiction anyway.

For example, I would like whether countries like China, India are self-sufficient when it comes foods. For example, if some country produces the wheat it if not, how much is imported and other stuff like that.

Lenin in Imperialism talks about the emergence of finance capital as the major driver of imperial conquests. These days we have seen trends of "financialisation" of western economies coupled with deindustrialisation.

I guess what confuses me is why this trend towards financialisation is a thing where you cede real material industrial power in favour of large banks.

Basically dress up the economics as futurism instead of tankie shit with its associations.

Marx said we should hold the means of production in common, and follow a socially beneficial plan. But a lot of audiences would roll their eyes and close their ears as soon as I said Marx.

If instead I say, "Artificial intelligence and computerised logistics are becoming so sophisticated we can think about phasing out the human element of management. We can choose democratically what we want the robots to do and they will produce it for us."

This might sound like subterfuge to some of you, but it's not actually dishonest. It's a correct way to describe a Marxian economy. I replaced the phrase "the means of production" with "the robots".

The real win here is you get around "It's easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism." People don't expect a Marxist world revolution. People don't expect the fall of capitalism. But people totally do expect robots and AI in the coming decades.

The ICJ case filed by South Africa I feel is the only concerted campaign I am seeing that pressuring Israel against committing genocidal settler colonialism (outside of the resistance by some Arab countries).

If ICJ is not a kangaroo court they will end up ruling their actions as genocide. The evidence is plenty.

Can any good come out of it? Or is it hot air?

Hello comrades. To preface my question, first let me give some brief context as to what led me here. I have been doing lots of reading of newer and older texts ranging from classic theory, history, civil rights, etc etc, in preparation for a book I intend to write in the future. However, as I have grown a bit tired of blowing through dense economic texts and academic material, I decided to try and find some communist newspapers to subscribe to and receive and read in the mail as a more of a literary appetizer and to see what said organizations have to say about modern happenings. I have become aware of Peace Land and Bread by Iskra(https://www.peacelandbread.org/journal), but the only other ones I see that aren't digital only are two sources. That being Socialist Revolution (https://socialistrevolution.org/) and The Militant (https://themilitant.com/) However I have noticed something worrying about The Militant. I did some light googling, found they have been around a long time, and are a Trotskyist paper. While I myself am not a Trotskyist, I still value other opinions from comrades and wanted to receive as wide of range of leftist reporting as possible. However I noticed their newest publications seem VERY pro Isreal and anti Palestinian liberation. This is confusing to me for what I think are obvious reasons. However I did some googling to see what their views were when you turn back the clock. This is a source from their page published in Oct 30th, 2000. (https://www.themilitant.com/2000/6441/index.shtml) Here, they are talking about the Palestinian struggle in a way that is a stark difference from their new stuff that seems aggressively pro Isreal. My question has two parts. 1. What happened to the militant between 2000 and 2023? 2. What in the hell makes a COMMUNIST NEWSPAPER PRO ISREAL? Is there some sect of socialist thought I am unaware of that is somehow pro isreal? If so, why? What is going through their heads? What's the thought process? I know many westerners struggle separating anti-Zionism with antisemitism in their heads, (which is a whole other mind numbing conversation) but I was under the OBVIOUSLY mistaken impression that Marxist are generally able to comprehend these kinds of socioeconomic nuances. I'm not sure how well known these papers are in the modern era, but that's why I am reaching out and posting this as many places of relevance I can. Somewhere, is some nerd that knows much, much more about socialist print history, the people behind them, and that whole specific 'scene' that just hasn't come up yet in my current state of research/education. So, if that fellow nerd is out there, I would love some in-depth explanations on this phenomenon. As for everyone else, I ask everyone to see what we can find about the MODERN people currently running the Militant, as that information is surprisingly hard to come by. I may be bad at 'googling,' but this seems very evasive which tends to raise my brow. I feel this could be an important problem for us to pay attention to as communist, for if this is a recent trend, or imperial propaganda is out right taking over socialist and communist outlets, which given the history of The Militant, makes me worry. They have been historically targeted by COINTELPRO and harassed, infiltrated, and so on and so on, the things we all know happened in that era. It could just be a stray string of renegade marxism, or, if it IS an intelligence operation, we need to know. With the rise of anti-isreal sentiment in America, the rise of leftism as well, it seems like something certain 3 letter agencies would be motivated to squash. I should also mention, I am not a 'conspiratorial' person, I find the trend of conspiracy in America to be dangerous and actively undermining our 'democracy.' This change in rhetoric is proof of nothing more than something, sometime, changed. It is up to us marxist to find out what, and how this happened. Thank you for your time comrades.