#Marxists.org

[redsolon]

The Bay Area Socialist Organizing Committee

In the early 1980s the Bay Area Socialist Organizing Committee, an anti-revisionist Marxist-Leninist organization, took as its primary task the investigation of the problems of party-building. They concluded that the subjective contradictions in our movement were primary in holding back progress toward revolution, over and above objective conditions. I agree, and I think it still holds true today.

The document they produced at the conclusion of their study is short and easy to read, but dense (the best kind of political writing). Unfortunately the only place you can find it online is in HTML form on that annoying, archaic website Marxists.org.

Since I like having PDFs, and I want to use the document as a tool for political study, I went and found a physical copy, and scanned it myself. I now provide it to the world, for anyone who needs it.

#socialism #communism #Marxism #Marxist theory #Marxism-Leninism #Maoism #revisionism #How have the anarchists lapped us on internet libraries? #The Anarchist Library is so much better organized and more extensive! #Marxists.org doesn't even include the CPP! #Why have we left it up to some crotchety Trot?

[dayurno]

the world is such that one day you will find yourself fully and truthfully answering an ask about kevin day being a maoist

#i invite kevin over for drinks and dinner 2 hours into the night i open marxists.org on my tv #listen i'm just- i'm just saying- communism could be really for you kevin. have you seen how judgeful these people are? #let's practice safe leftist infighting. bend over #txt #kevin

[revolutionarysuicide]

kind of crazy how goodreads is owned by amazon. you would think that amazon would have the funds to create a website that loads in under 30 seconds with a modern fast internet connection, but alas,

#no really why is their website so bad #i struggle to think of other websites i use on a semi regular basis that are that bad #no marxists.org does not count. it's simple it's got no js and it's fast #and if they ever modernise the design i will kill myself

[postleft]

Fairy Tales for Workers Children, 1925

#words #via marxists.org

[morgenlich]

anyway i am thinking about this documentary we watched in the first class i read marx for, and mostly i have forgotten the doc but i do remember some rich businessman saying that whatever else there is to say about marx he did a great job describing capitalism

#and I have a lot of thoughts about that #anyway go to marxists.org #they’ve got the Texts in a variety of languages for free

[emeraldeaa]

reading krupskaya's Reminiscences of Lenin and hooting and hollering like im at a sports game

#not exactly 'reading theory' on marxists.org rn but damn is it fun #communism #mlm #sorry boys its the other kind of mlm

[void-lich]

I used to be one of those people who were like “well you don’t have to read a bunch of theory to be a real socialist” and then I read a bunch of theory and had my view of society and politics radically restructured and it’s like…yeah i’m so sorry babygirl you actually do need to read theory to be a real socialist

#the anarchist library and marxists.org are both good resources depending on your bent

[465]

"Naturalists imagine that they are emancipating themselves from philosophy when they ignore or abuse it. But as they cannot stir a step without thought, while for thought logical definitions are necessary; and these definitions they incautiously borrow either from the current theoretical property of so-called educated people, who are dominated by the remnants of long-passed-away philosophic systems, or else from their uncritical and unsystematic reading of all kinds of philosophical works: in the long run they prove after all to be prisoners to philosophy, but, unfortunately, for the most part philosophy of the very worst quality. And so people who are particularly vehement in abusing philosophy become the slaves of the worst vulgarized relies of the worst philosophical systems"

Friedrich Engels, Dialectics of Nature, 1872-1882

#using the english translation in the translation of the b zavadovsky piece #cuz i like how it reads better comparing it with the english translation on marxists.org against the original german #friedrich engels #engels #reading

[sivavakkiyar]

holy shit a Watson essay on Zappa actually made it to Marxists.org. that’s hilarious

#probably as a part of the magazine archive? #everyone mocks Marxists.org now and for good reason but it’s all I had as a kid #I for one am glad they’ve never updated it

[baeddling]

Follow-up to the post I reblogged i will always recommend Socialism Made Easy by James Connolly

#big fan #also look for the iww's pdf #the version on marxists.org isn't complete

[damnesdelamer]

DECOLONIAL ACTION READING

I recently compiled these to add to a comrade’s post about Land Back, but actually I think they deserve their own post as well.

Amílcar Cabral - Return To The Source

Frantz Fanon - The Wretched Of The Earth

Hô Chí Minh - archive via Marxists.org

Thomas King - The Inconvenient Indian

Abdullah Öcalan - Women’s Revolution & Democratic Confederalism

Edward Said - The Question Of Palestine

Thomas Sankara - archive via Marxists.org

Eve Tuck & K. Wayne Yang - Decolonization Is Not A Metaphor

Other key names in postcolonial theory and its practical application include:

Sara Ahmed

Homi K. Bhabha

Aimé Césaire

Albert Memmi

Jean-Paul Sartre

Léopold Séder Senghor

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak

All of these will help you interpret and confront the realities of colonisation, and ideally help us understand and extend solidarity to comrades around the globe. Decolonise your mind, and don't stop there!

#land back #postcolonial #postcolonialism #postcolonial theory #decolonization #decolonize #decolonise #decolonisation #Edward Said #Tuck & Yang #Frantz Fanon #Amilcar Cabral #Free Ocalan #Sankara #Ho Chi Minh #Thomas Sankara #Abdullah Ocalan #original #Thomas King #Eve Tuck #K. Wayne Yang

[txttletale]

hey, "sorta-long time viewer, first time asker", thought i'd reach out to ask about your recommended reading on socialist/communist theory. besides the obvious like the Communist Manifesto and the works of Lenin and such

optionally, i'd appreciate sources to access and read what you pick out, but i can probably manage on my own without them

please and thanks! <3

obviously bear in mind that my perspective is just one and quite limited -- & also that i very much approach marxist theory from the lenses of anti-imperialism and cultural studies. that said, my basic recommended reading list of books that equipped me with the ideological tools i have now would look something like:

engels, principles of communism

marx, wage labour & capital

marx, the german ideology

engels, socialism: utopian & scientific

luxemburg, reform or revolution?

lenin, the state & revolution

lenin, imperialism: the highest stage of capitalism

fanon, the wretched of the earth

rodney, how europe underdeveloped africa

nkrumah, neocolonialism: the last stage of imperialism

gramsci, the prison notebooks

adorno & horkheimer, the culture industry

parenti, inventing reality

chomsky & herman, manufacturing consent

benjamin, the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction

castro, capitalism in crisis

a lot of these texts can be found for free on marxists.org. the rest can be found for free on all kinds of cool websites if you type their name into google search with 'pdf free' at the end

#ask

[alicearmageddon]

USEFUL ANARCHIST AND LEFTIST SITES ON THE WEB

1: The Anarchist Faq: this attempts to answer any questions one might have about anarchism. (the anarchist library, which this faq is on, is also an absolutley excellent rescource and maybe the biggest collection of anarchist theory on the web)

2: the tv tropes page for anarchism (yes, im serious). this manages to be a suprisingly well done and easy to read explanation of what anarchism is, what its about, and the different types of anarchists idealogies.

3: Anarchopedia. like wikipedia, but specifically for anarchism

more resources below the cut! and feel free to add more in reblogs.

4: the iww. the iww isnt anarchist, but im putting it here as its a member-led, grassroots union for all workers of the world.

iww.org

5: Zoe Baker has a PHD in anarchist history and is one of the few well researched and well read left politcs channels on youtube

youtube.com/@anarchopac

6: Organize magazine is a good source of anarchist news in the UK

organisemagazine.org.uk

7: Freedom News is another great source of anarchist news in the UK

freedomnews.org.uk

8: Mutual Aid Hub (afaik this is US only)

mutualaidhub.org

9:Black Rose Federation (also US only)

blackrosefed.org

10: symbiosis revolution (US only)

symbiosis-revolution.org

11: Marxists Internet Archive. while this site isnt really anarchist, it is leftist and has some anarchist texts. i also think marxism is worth learning about even as an anarchist whos views do not align with Marx.

Marxists.org

12: Neighborhood Anarchists. Neighborhood Anarchists is a direct action anarchist group based in Springfield and Eugene Oregon.

neighborhoodanarchists.org

13: Anarchist News. This is a site that provides news that is relevant to or about anarchism

Anarchistnews.org

14: A-Infos. This is a multi-lingual news service by, for, and about anarchists.

https://www.ainfos.ca/en/

15: CrimeThInk. This is an international network of aspiring revolutionaries all over the world.

crimethinc.com

16: It's Going Down. This is a digital community center for anarchist, anti-fascist, autonomous anti-capitalist and anti-colonial movements across so-called North America.

itsgoingdown.org

17: Libcom. This is is a resource for everyone fighting to improve their lives, communities and working conditions.

libcom.org

18: Unicorn Riot. This is a decentralized, educational non-profit media organization.

unicornriot.ninja

19: Submedia. Submedia is an anarchist digital media collective that produces videos and podcasts

sub.media

20: Zine Library. This is a compilation of anarchist zines and booklets, imposed for easy printing, as well as a few posters. (zines can be downloaded by pressing code > download zip)

github.com/rechelon/zine_library

#anarchism #anarchy #anarchist #leftist #leftism #capitalism #socialism #communism

[yourtongzhihazel]

I would be interested to hear more of your thoughts about the banning of certain media sites in china, as i have never seen someone be in favour of it before and i generally like your blog. What do you think the benefits are? What are the common criticisms you see of this kind of policy that you disagree with? (Or maybe ive misinterpreted a sarcastic or hyperbolic post as being genuine, sorry if that is the case) Youve encouraged me to learn more about chinas economy and communist countries economic policies in more detail so thank you for that.

There's a few things behind it. The first is that China has a lot of domestic equivalents for things like youtube, facebook, or whatever else people use these days so even if these websites aren't accessible, it's not like people don't have ways of social media-ing or whatever.

Second, if you really want to access western online media in China, be it, you've just moved over and is just slowly getting used to things or you are simply a masochistic freak (like me), Chinese citizens can just download a VPN to bypass the GFW (though I'm not sure why you'd want to; Chinese netizens are fucking hilarious lol).

Third, I think most people would agree that not every site should exist. What do I mean by this? For example, kiwifarms. A site like that would have been banned in China, even if it was a domestic version. Han nationalist sites, racist, anti-lgbt, covid truthing/anti-lockdown, etc. sites are all up for axing once they are found and/or reported.

The last point is that all these western media outlets are bourgeoisie controlled and owned and as such, has a bourgeois class nature and bourgeois ideology. As such, they are, by all means, bourgeois mouthpieces and propaganda outlets. This is entirely antagonistic to the ideology and values of the proletariat. For example, all of Chinese state media is vehemently pro-Palestinian, while western sources consistently cover for israel and justify genocide. The people of China should view proletarian media, with a proletarian class nature and proletarian ideology instead, rather than western propaganda outlets.

marxists.org, despite being trot, is not banned in China! This is left-unity!

#Hazel's press releases

[hungwy]

its just funny what kind of shit marxists.org has sometimes. why is bf skinner in there

[iberiancadre]

Let the bourgeoisie and the pacifists, the generals and the petty bourgeoisie, the capitalists and the philistines, the pious Christians and the knights of the Second and the Two-and-a-Half Internationals vent their fury against that revolution. No torrents of abuse, calumnies and lies can enable them to conceal the historic fact that for the first time in hundreds and thousands of years the slaves have replied to a war between slave-owners by openly proclaiming the slogan: “Convert this war between slave-owners for the division of their loot into a war of the slaves of all nations against the slave-owners of all nations.” For the first time in hundreds and thousands of years that slogan has grown from a vague and helpless waiting into a clear and definite political programme, into an effective struggle waged by millions of oppressed people under the leadership of the proletariat; it has grown into the first victory of the proletariat, the first victory in the struggle to abolish war and to unite the workers of all countries against the united bourgeoisie of different nations, against the bourgeoisie that makes peace and war at the expense of the slaves of capital, the wage-workers, the peasants, the working people. This first victory is not yet the final victory, and it was achieved by our October Revolution at the price of incredible difficulties and hardships, at the price of unprecedented suffering, accompanied by a series of serious reverses and mistakes on our part. How could a single backward people be expected to frustrate the imperialist wars of the most powerful and most developed countries of the world without sustaining reverses and without committing mistakes! We are not afraid to admit our mistakes and shall examine them dispassionately in order to learn how to correct them. But the fact remains that for the first time in hundreds and thousands of years the promise “to reply” to war between the slave-owners by a revolution of the slaves directed against all the slave-owners has been completely fulfilled—and is being fulfilled despite all difficulties. We have made the start. When, at what date and time, and the proletarians of which nation will complete this process is not important. The important thing is that the ice has been broken; the road is open, the way has been shown. Gentlemen, capitalists of all countries, keep up your hypocritical pretence of “defending the fatherland”—the Japanese fatherland against the American, the American against the Japanese, the French against the British, and so forth! Gentlemen, knights of the Second and Two-and a-Half Internationals, pacifist petty bourgeoisie and philistines of the entire world, go on “evading” the question of how to combat imperialist wars by issuing new “Basle Manifestos” (on the model of the Basle Manifesto of 1912). The first Bolshevik revolution has wrested the first hundred million people of this earth from the clutches of imperialist war and the imperialist world. Subsequent revolutions will deliver the rest of mankind from such wars and from such a world.

Fourth Anniversary of the October Revolution, V. I. Lenin, 1921. via marxists.org

#Lenin #quote