this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2025
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[–] [email protected] 25 points 9 hours ago

I can't remember where I copied this from originally but it seems pertinent here

Americans are, of course, the most thoroughly and passively indoctrinated people on earth. they know next to nothing as a rule about their own history, or the histories of other nations, or the histories of the various social movements that have risen and fallen in the past, and they certainly know nothing of the complexities and contradictions comprised within words like ‘socialism’ and ‘capitalism.’

Chiefly, what they have been trained not to know or even suspect is that, in many ways, they enjoy far fewer freedoms, and suffer under a more intrusive centralized state, than do the citizens of countries with more vigorous social-democratic institutions.

This is is at once the most comic and most tragic aspect of the excitable alarm that talk of social democracy or democratic socialism can elicit on these shores.

An enormous number of Americans have been persuaded to believe that they are freer in the abstract than, say, Germans or Danes precisely because they possess far fewer freedoms in the concrete.

They are far more vulnerable to medical and financial crisis, far more likely to receive inadequate health coverage, far more prone too irreparable insolvency, far more unprotected against predatory creditors, far more subject to income inequality, and so forth, while effectively paying more in tax (when one figures in federal, state, local and sales taxes, and then compounds those by all the expenditures that in this country, as almost nowhere else, their taxes do not cover).

One might think that a people who once rebelled against the mightiest empire on earth on the principle of no taxation without representation would not meekly accept taxation without adequate government services.

But we accept what we have become used to, I suppose. Even so, one has to ask, what state apparatus in the “free” world could be more powerful and tyrannical than the one that taxes its citizens while providing no substantial civic benefits in return, solely in order to enrich a piratically overinflated military-industrial complex and to ease the tax burdens of the immensely wealthy.

[–] [email protected] 62 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

Lisa's only mistake was saying yes.

Just do every single thing in socialism, but change every single word. Call it Americanism.

Proletariat? No, just "worker".

Bourgeoisie? No, just "elites".

Capital? "Stuff". Like how in baseball they say a pitcher's got good "stuff". Use your human stuff.

Class Consciousness - "common sense".

Dialectical Materialism - Idk I'm still trying to figure out wtf that one means.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 hour ago

Historically, this just doesn't work, and it even risks supporting PatSoc movements like the American Communist Party (not to be confused with the CPUSA), also known as "MAGA Communism." Essentially Imperialism combined with Communist aesthetics.

In the lead-up to the Russian Revolution, there was disagreement over the necessity of reading theory. The SRs thought it was unneccessary, and got in the way of unity. Lenin and the Bolsheviks disagreed, as theory informs correct practice. The SRs became a footnotez and the Bolsheviks succeeded in establishing the world's first Socialist state. One of Lenin's most fanous lines, from What is to be done? is "without revolutionary theory, there can be no revolutionary practice."

As studying theory is necessary, people will realize you're repackaging Socialism. This will backfire, and people will realize they've been tricked. This will hurt the movement.

As for Dialectical Materialism, in a nutshell it's the philosophical backbone of Marxism. It's an analytical tool, focusing on studying material reality as it exists in context and in motion through time, as well as their contradictions. If you want an introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list that will teach you the fundamentals, I have one here that I made.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 14 hours ago

Dialectical materialism -> Scientific materialism to distinguish it from the common usage of the world "materialism"

[–] [email protected] 11 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago) (1 children)

You people have good luck with this? I haven't. I don't find that you can just "trick" people into believing in socialism by changing the words. The moment if becomes obvious you're criticizing free markets and the rich and advocating public ownership they will catch on.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Correct, and it even risks supporting PatSoc movements like the American Communist Party (not to be confused with the CPUSA), also known as "MAGA Communism." Essentially Imperialism combined with Communist aesthetics.

Being honest with what you want and why has a far better track record, we see this in Socialist revolutions and in mg own personal experience with outreach.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

I live in the USA and its so bad i just cant interact with most people. They are basically entirely vibes based. They dont research anything if they hear a new claim they decide if its true based on if they feel like its true. You can literally show them evidence and most will be like "nah thats bs". I made a comment on 小红书 recently about how 54% of americans read below a 6th grade level and my replies are FULL of americans saying "uh i can read" .... can you really?

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[–] [email protected] 59 points 17 hours ago

about what youd expect for a country thats been the global epicenter for anticommunist propaganda.

[–] [email protected] 86 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

American try to care one iota for your fellow man or really anyone other than yourself challenge (impossible):

[–] [email protected] 35 points 16 hours ago (11 children)

During covid, going to a rural area in the US really got to me. The population is so individualistic / freedom-brained / "i do whatever I want all the time", that their grandmothers all dying meant nothing to them. I got mine keeps meaning smaller and smaller groups of people.

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