The Portuguese Communist Party hosts an yearly festival since 1976, and this year marked its 50th edition. The festival lasts 3 days and has a variety of concerts, debates, expositions, and his closed by the traditional speech. In the end we all get together and sing the unofficial party anthem, the Internacional, the national anthem and Carvalhesa (the song you hear in the video). This year there was a very special intervention from the President of Cuba, Miguel Diaz Angel reporting on how Cuban people are struggling due to the criminal blockade imposed the imperalistic US.

You cam see the full speech [here](https://www.youtube.com/live/DC7Lm6XicGc?is=nYNaXgdGXodNVdFo).

It was beautiful, people of several nationalities, genres, races and ages all together. And I was there in the midst of this crowd!!

As organizações seguem determinadas regras e padrões de funcionamento, com processos e tarefas documentadas e instituídas formalmente, criadas geralmente por órgãos internacionais, que obtiveram os resultados esperados e tidos como bons, e ao longo do tempo foram sendo reconhecidas e adotadas como padrão de boas práticas pelas empresas. Essas "normas ou processos" foram sendo incrementadas e evoluindo até os modelos atuais, e continuam a evoluir à medida que o ambiente, as leis ou circunstâncias mercadológicas também evoluem.

Eles podem constituir um delimitador que mais contribui para alienação e exploração e tecnologia e alienação nas organizações, e, se consideradas as consequências ruinosas da sua utilização, poderemos, no mínimo, questionar os benefícios resultantes de tais técnicas. Processos como o ITIL, COBIT serão as metodologias citadas neste estudo, embasando as proposições apresentadas. Técnicas mais recentes, como Lean e DevOps, representam a tendência mais atual e "inovadora" sendo adotada maciçamente pelo mercado em níveis cada vez mais crescentes.

As organizações são a engrenagem quebrada do capitalismo, pois, apesar de produzirem os serviços ou produtos a serem comercializados, estas carregam no seu bojo um repertório de contradições, sendo camufladas no dia a dia e tornando-se carentes de sentido, sendo inclusive apropriadas ideologicamente. O objetivo de garantir o lucro através do controle dos custos, tempo e recursos são os princípios norteadores.

Organizações destoantes do modelo padrão estão fadadas ao fracasso. Crises sazonais do sistema capitalista o permitem se recompor e continuar seu ciclo, mas as contradições internas, amplamente já estudadas, e também a ideologia dominante disseminada e ocorrida em todos os planos da hierarquia organizacional, partindo dos níveis estratégicos, e sendo gradualmente adotada pelos níveis inferiores, tornam as possibilidades de mudança muito difíceis e o modelo instituído difícil de ser questionado.

O pensamento meritocrático, a gestão do conhecimento empresarial, a especialização absoluta e os sistemas que sustentam essas metodologias tornam-se a base para metrificar as atividades e o trabalhador disporá somente dessas ferramentas para registrar seu tempo de trabalho, tarefas, responsabilidade, etc. Assim, o empregado é um agente passivo no processo. Terá pouca ou nenhuma autonomia para pensar e inovar. Constitui-se uma peça da estrutura, sem capacidade de promover qualquer mudança.

Desde o taylorismo/Fordismo, passando pela teoria sistêmica e a administração por objetivos e a orientada por projetos, os diversos modelos de administração e gerenciamento, normas e padrões utilizados pelas organizações, são estruturados e definidos para atender aos requisitos do capital, pautados pelo lucro, criando a obsolescência programada, perseguindo a redução de custos, aumentando a automatização de processos, promovendo reestruturações, etc. Crises sistêmicas, redução de direitos trabalhistas e salários, antes garantidos pela lei, são cada vez mais iminentes de serem revogados ou reduzidos.

Apostar em uma evolução benéfica para a sociedade, partindo do modelo atual (que indica claramente a redução de muitos empregos com a adoção do Lean e do DevOps), não parece plausível. O trabalho, que antes era responsabilidade de um indivíduo, que desempenhava a tarefa, agora é controlado e registrado, sendo metrificado pela empresa, que possui todos os tempos, atividades e desempenho do trabalhador, além do conhecimento. Assim constrói-se e molda-se um novo tipo de trabalhador e uma nova classe, os "infoproletários".

Focando nos aspectos positivos, omitindo informações, aumentando a especialização por cursos custeados pela empresa, promessa de novos salários e cargos, inclusive, por exemplo, colocando a automatização como situação necessária a fim de evitar a falência ou mesmo demissões, pois a concorrência do mercado é a causadora de todas as mudanças, ao trabalhador restam poucas alternativas:

• Trabalhar sob um paradigma negativo, ou seja, sua preocupação constante é não cometer desvios e seguir os processos instituídos sob a ameaça permanente da punição, porém freando e controlando seu ímpeto construtivo e criativo, aderindo aos processos e regras;
• Questionando-as, transgredindo-as e exercendo seu papel criativo, incentivando ou promovendo tentativas de mudança. Nesse último caso, ainda terá de lutar para que suas habilidades e criatividade sejam ouvidas, muitas vezes ofuscadas pelo medo constante da demissão ou punição dos próprios companheiros, na maioria dos casos, limitando progressivamente suas capacidades inatas.

Visto dessa forma, concluímos que sempre haverá limitadores e obstáculos para o exercício pleno da capacidade de criar e transformar do trabalhador, pois todos são regidos pelos processos, normas e sistemas padrões Paradigmáticos, pouco flexíveis quanto à sua forma e estabelecidos formalmente como os melhores e consagrados.

É inegável que essas mudanças têm ocorrido assim, de forma que a sociedade as está percebendo. Mas, diferente de outras épocas, essa mesma sociedade tem se limitado a conformar-se, muitas vezes, iludida pelos donos do capital, de que tais mudanças são benéficas; noutros tempos, em que passava por elas, sem notar, e, somente depois, haveriam de reivindicar os benefícios perdidos, atualmente ocorre algo sem precedentes: as mudanças são conhecidas, divulgadas e adotadas voluntariamente justamente por quem deveria questioná-las.

Podemos estabelecer muitos níveis e graus diferentes de esforço, conhecimento, autonomia, formas, características, personalidade, interatividade, poder, etc. que os indivíduos devem possuir para a realização de atividades. Comumente, as ocupações que demandam maior esforço físico e estão nos níveis mais inferiores da pirâmide do poder são as menos recompensadas pelas benesses sociais e financeiras.

Essa classe de trabalhadores é a que teria a possibilidade de realizar alguma mudança, por serem em maior número, porém estão totalmente imobilizados e destituídos de qualquer capacidade do contraditório, ao serem oprimidos e cerceados pelos níveis superiores da pirâmide e pela ideologia imposta perversa do dono dos meios de produção, sendo que esses trabalhadores muitas vezes se veem na necessidade de subsistência e sobrevivência.

A mudança poderia ter sua gestação a partir da classe dominante. Porém, esta classe detentora dos meios de produção, além de não ter nenhum interesse em promover qualquer mudança que lhes tiraria o seu próprio poder, é vítima do mesmo engodo da classe dominante que as classes inferiores sofrem, ao acreditar no sistema que lhe é imposto. São subjugadas e são ideologicamente doutrinadas primorosamente pelo discurso capitalista.

A alienação do trabalhador, conforme Marx explica: "A forma das condições de trabalho alienadas deste, autônoma frente a ele, e, por isso, transfigurada, na qual os meios de produção criados se convertem em capital e a terra em terra monopolizada, em propriedade territorial, esta forma correspondente a um determinado período histórico, coincide, por conseguinte, com a existência e a função dos meios de produção criados e da terra no processo de produção em geral." (T.3, L.3, S.7, Cap. XLVIII, p. 831-832).

E amplamente debatido em inúmeras obras, significa a incapacidade do indivíduo de se apropriar do seu trabalho e de ver uma identidade única, sua, do resultado a que se dedicou. Ao desmembrar um produto ou serviço em atividades desempenhadas por diversos trabalhadores, retira-se também o sentido e o valor de seu trabalho, pois este só será perceptível na mercadoria final, muitas vezes também inacessível.

As escolas e universidades, bem como a família e as instituições em geral, são reprodutoras da ideologia capitalista e dominante. O indivíduo é preparado e doutrinado ideologicamente de maneira que pensar criticamente e questionar os paradigmas instituídos não somente é subversivo, mas também está além de seu horizonte de pensamento. Portanto, essa realidade que lhe é imposta é a única possível e viável e é a que lhe garante a sobrevivência. Para se manter empregado, o trabalhador deve produzir cada vez mais e melhor, por exemplo, automatizando uma atividade, mas aí, justamente pelo seu trabalho bem realizado na automatização, se tornará desnecessário e sem recursos para consumir esse mesmo produto, pois estará sem trabalho.

Essa é uma contradição sistêmica. Uma contradição interna seria o incentivo ao compartilhamento das informações com outros membros da equipe, pois a colaboração é um valor muito apreciado, temos de manter o conhecimento disperso, é dito nas reuniões. O objetivo, obviamente, é torná-lo dispensável e substituível. Por que na atualidade é comum a realização de atividades em forma de processos cada vez mais compartimentalizados, institucionalizados e especializados? Onde o conhecimento e a criatividade são retirados ao máximo do trabalhador?

A resposta é complexa, pois talvez a pergunta que deveríamos fazer seja por que chegamos ao modelo atual de negócios, onde o ser humano é peça-chave do desenvolvimento ao mesmo tempo em que é destinado a produzir contra si e a promover seu próprio sofrimento.

Okay, I know the title can be seen as a bit provocative but my question is genuine. I'm quite familiar with Althusser's work and his theory of ideology so given the fact that ideology is the "representation" of the imaginary relation to the actual conditions of life and constitutes the intermediation which distributes subjects to social practices as dictated by the class division of labor, I'm curious about how you understand the application of the theory in the case of the inmates of Auschwitz; if we assume we're only talking about relatively healthy inmates who are given the "chance" to survive a bit longer by working and are not murdered immediately, there's certainly a set of social practices at play.

At the same time, while one could argue that being an Auschwitz inmate constitutes the most total negation of subjectivity, I'd say that this is only true given a certain normative concept of subjectivity; not generally true. Furthermore, given that there's no single process of becoming the always - already present subject, an inmate would still retain a multitude of aspects of other instances of subjectivisation; no matter their present material conditions, one could argue that they'd still retain a sense of self, a sense of free will (although extremely restricted by the context) and a sense of being able to be held responsible for their actions.

If we agree on the thesis that the pair of identification and misidentification leads to the idea that subjectivity necessarily entails an element of "voluntary" assertion, I'd say that Auschwitz, seen as a factory of death, cannot impose any althussian notion of subjectivity on its inmates. Seen as a forced labor camp, on the other hand, it probably can. Here I think that the general idea of what the process of subjectivisation looks like seems similar to the cases of a sweatshop or a prison. But can we actually claim that given the fact that a huge part of the ideology present at the material practices taking place in Auschwitz was purely instrumental, as depicted in the case of its infamous gate sign? Doesn't this example of ideology look extremely similar to the idea on the basis of which the 18th century anticlerical critique was formed? I'm reminding you that this would be the very same "theory of ideology" which is criticized by Althusser for treating ideology as a network of consciously fabricated lies the creators of which were completely unaffected by their mystifying implications.

我现在想在外网（reddit）上寻找下来自中国的列宁主义者同志。

那种“老牌布尔什维克”的传统列宁主义，希望能和这类同志认识并交流一下。如果愿意并有意向与我交流的话，可以来私信我。

我本人也是比较偏向列宁主义。
哦对了，大家如果有了解的话，能否给我介绍一些适合列宁主义者的网站、论坛之类的供学习使用的？

My humble review of Karl Marx's most famous publication, The Communist Manifesto, and the controversy and lasting legacy it has had. A word of warning: I do critique his theory and conclusions, which could be interpreted as offensive to some.

How does Karl promote people to work?
How does he envision the communist state to generate wealth?
uncentralized distribution systems lead to long food lines and starvation, how does he cure that
why is there no abundance in communism?

How can a stateless society be achieved , how can everyone be equal in the 1st place if god himselvs has made us different, different by mind, by body, by place of birth, by abilities, by intrests?

Hello. Would anyone be willing to recommend an essay/excerpt by Marx wherein he discusses aesthetics or the question of what makes something beautiful. Additionally, what are the strongest Marxist (as opposed to a Marx primary text) works which deal with aesthetics? Lastly, if anyone would be so generous, I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts (Marxist or Marxist-sympathetic redditors) about what the proper Marxist understanding of beauty and aesthetics is.

So,, I am fairly new to Marxism and learning about it, Ive been reading theory over the past couple of months and I had this question. When we talk about defining what communism is, I often hear people say, "stateless, moneyless, classless society", but after talking to a couple people is this really true? Ive heard that this notion is only really talked about in the critique of the Gotha programme and they're labeled more as like byproducts of communism, hence these things being described as something that withers away rather than abolished. Then when actually defining communism, we would be defining it more like a process rather than a set state of being, it being a process towards the liberation of the proletariat. So essentially what I am asking is if this definition of communism being a stateless moneyless classless society is true or false?

The historical-materialist analysis of Reddit moderators begins from the contradiction between their formally voluntary status and their objectively productive function within the platform economy.

The moderator is officially a volunteer, and Reddit explicitly describes moderators as unpaid users responsible for maintaining and organizing communities. At the same time, the moderator performs a series of activities without which the platform would become substantially less usable: removing spam, enforcing rules, organizing discussion, resolving disputes, maintaining community standards, and producing the conditions under which user-generated content can continue to circulate. The moderator therefore occupies a peculiar position within the digital division of labor. They are formally outside the wage relation while materially participating in the production of the environment from which the platform derives value.
This contradiction is fundamental. The Reddit moderator is neither an employee nor an ordinary user. The ordinary user consumes and produces content, while the moderator additionally performs the supervisory and administrative labor necessary to make that production socially usable. The moderator is therefore a form of unpaid intermediary labor. Their task is not primarily to create commodities but to maintain the conditions under which commodities, in this case attention, content, interaction, and user engagement, can circulate. The moderator cleans the digital factory floor while insisting that they are merely helping out at a community center.

This arrangement is especially significant because the moderator does not experience their labor primarily as labor. The ideological form of volunteering conceals the productive character of the activity. A moderator may perceive themselves as defending a community, preserving a particular culture, preventing spam, or ensuring that discussions remain interesting. All of these descriptions can be subjectively sincere. Yet from the standpoint of political economy, the distinction between voluntary stewardship and productive labor becomes less stable when the activity systematically contributes to the reproduction of a platform whose economic value depends upon sustained user participation.

The moderator consequently occupies the position of a peculiar petty administrator within the digital superstructure. They possess limited coercive authority over ordinary users but possess no corresponding ownership of the infrastructure within which that authority operates. They can remove a post but cannot determine the architecture of the website. They can ban a user but cannot define the platform’s fundamental terms of service. They can establish local rules but remain subordinate to Reddit’s sitewide rules and administrative authority. The apparent sovereignty of the subreddit therefore conceals a deeper dependency.

This is why the subreddit can be understood as a small-scale political economy. The users produce content. The platform owns the infrastructure. The moderators regulate the conditions under which production occurs. The resulting structure resembles neither a traditional workplace nor a conventional public institution. It is a hybrid arrangement in which governance has been partially delegated downward without ownership being transferred. The moderator receives authority without capital and responsibility without wages.

The ideological significance of this arrangement lies in the fact that moderation authority can substitute for material compensation. The moderator does not receive a salary, but receives permissions. They acquire access to tools, status markers, private channels, modmail, moderation queues, and the ability to impose sanctions on other users. The symbolic compensation of authority therefore partially replaces economic compensation. This is not necessarily a conscious strategy on the part of the individual moderator. It is a structural feature of the system. The unpaid worker is offered control over a small administrative domain in place of control over the productive infrastructure itself.
The result is a peculiar form of digital petty power.

The moderator is powerful relative to the user and powerless relative to the platform. This intermediate position produces a characteristic ideological consciousness. The moderator can experience themselves as the owner of the subreddit because they possess practical authority over it, even though their authority remains institutionally contingent. They may spend years developing rules, norms, aesthetics, traditions, automations, and internal procedures, only to discover that the ultimate authority over the infrastructure belongs elsewhere.

The contradiction becomes particularly visible when Reddit intervenes in moderator activity. Reddit’s current Moderator Code of Conduct establishes expectations concerning stability, reasonable expectations, activity, integrity, and cooperation, while retaining mechanisms through which moderators can be removed or communities can be reorganized. The moderator is therefore autonomous in one sense and subordinate in another. They are expected to govern locally while remaining governable from above.

This produces what may be called the contradiction of delegated sovereignty. Reddit delegates enough authority to moderators that they become responsible for the practical functioning of communities, but not enough authority to become independent institutional actors. The moderator is consequently responsible for outcomes they do not completely control. If a community becomes chaotic, the moderator is blamed. If moderation becomes excessive, the moderator is blamed. If spam increases, the moderator is blamed. If the platform changes its tools, policies, or incentives, the moderator must adapt. Responsibility descends more easily than sovereignty.

The situation becomes even more interesting when the platform attempts to quantify moderator activity. The moment voluntary labor is measured, it begins to acquire the characteristics of managed labor. Activity requirements, engagement metrics, moderation queues, response expectations, and administrative oversight transform the qualitative task of community stewardship into measurable performance. A recent discussion among moderators illustrates precisely this anxiety: some moderators describe Reddit’s increasing expectations as resembling employment despite the continued absence of wages.

This is a classic problem of managerial rationality. Once an activity becomes measurable, the measurement can become an objective in itself. A moderator who originally entered the role to preserve a community may gradually become concerned with maintaining activity indicators, responding to queues, satisfying administrative expectations, or demonstrating continued usefulness. The metric ceases to describe the labor and begins to organize it. What was originally a community becomes an administrative workplace without the corresponding transformation of the worker into an employee.

The moderator therefore represents a peculiar stage in the development of platform capitalism: the partial privatization of governance combined with the socialization of its labor costs. Reddit supplies the infrastructure, while users produce content and moderators perform a substantial portion of the governance necessary to keep that content organized and usable. The economic system benefits from all three layers while only one of them is conventionally recognized as labor. The platform’s most interesting resource is consequently not merely user-generated content but user-generated administration.

This also explains why moderation disputes are so disproportionately emotional. A ban is never merely a ban. The moderator experiences it as the exercise of legitimate community authority; the user experiences it as arbitrary domination; the platform experiences it as one component of a broader governance system. Each actor therefore interprets the same event according to a different position within the structure. The resulting conflict is often personalized because the underlying relations are difficult to see. The user calls the moderator a tyrant. The moderator calls the user a troll. The platform calls both participants members of the community.

The term “mod” consequently conceals a substantial amount of social differentiation. There is the exhausted moderator performing routine maintenance, the ideological moderator enforcing a highly specific conception of acceptable discourse, the absentee moderator who retains nominal authority without meaningful participation, the hobbyist moderator who treats the subreddit as a personal project, and the power-oriented moderator whose primary reward consists in controlling other users. These figures cannot be reduced to a single psychological type because they occupy different positions within the same institutional structure.

The most interesting figure is perhaps the moderator who sincerely believes that they are defending democracy while exercising an administrative veto over another person’s speech. Reddit itself describes its moderation model in democratic terms, emphasizing self-organization, community-specific rules, voting, and shared responsibility. Yet democracy at the level of discourse does not necessarily imply democratic ownership of the infrastructure. The subreddit can therefore function as a miniature republic whose constitution ultimately rests upon privately controlled servers and platform policies.

This contradiction should not be interpreted simply as hypocrisy. The system genuinely contains democratic elements. Users do create communities, establish norms, vote on content, and participate in collective governance. But these forms of participation exist inside a privately owned technical infrastructure. The result is a hybrid political form: communal governance inside a corporate platform. The moderator becomes the local administrator of this contradiction.

The historical-materialist conclusion is therefore that the Reddit moderator should not primarily be understood as an annoying person with a colored username. They are a structurally produced social type. Their existence follows from the necessity of governing enormous quantities of decentralized user production without converting every act of governance into conventional wage labor. The moderator solves this problem by occupying the space between user and employee.

The tragedy, if one insists upon using such a dramatic term for Reddit, is that the moderator is offered precisely enough power to become invested in the system and precisely little enough ownership to remain subordinate to it. They moderate the community but do not own the platform. They enforce the rules but do not ultimately write all of them. They perform labor but are not employees. They exercise authority but remain administratively replaceable. They maintain the conditions of digital production while being ideologically encouraged to understand this maintenance as a hobby.

The Reddit moderator is therefore the ideal subject of platform capitalism: voluntarily productive, partially empowered, structurally subordinate, emotionally invested, administratively measurable, and perpetually convinced that the unpaid labor of maintaining a multinational technology company’s infrastructure is actually about “keeping the community nice.”

The fact that Iran is fighting off an imperial aggression on it does not make anti-imperialist, much like fighting off a thief robbing our house does not make us crime fighters. To give a well-known example, France and the UK fought off genocidal fascist Germany although they were genocidal fascist states themselves.

What would make Iran an anti-imperialist force is its political program. Yet, it has supported and welcomed support from the colony, selling oil to it and buying weapons from it in the 80s. During the past 15 years, its allies in Syria and Iraq disregarded the U.S. occupation there. Although it has claimed “unity” of fields with Palestine, Lebanon and Syria against the colony for years, it never took military action when the colony aggressed these fields, including the genocide in the fields of Gaza and South Lebanon, although it was quick to respond decisively when its own “field” was aggressed. And back home, it has doubled down on the identitarian patterns used by imperialism to fragment society, discriminating in favor of Shiite males.

This does not mean it is the villain the aggressors are portraying it to be. For example, Iran does not seek to genocide Jews. It is one of the few countries in the world to support a one-state solution in Palestine, making a difference between Jewish Palestinians and Jewish settlers, and pushing forward a model where the latter would either remain in peace or leave in peace.

This also does not mean the colony and the U.S. are justified in their aggression on it, for a number of reasons too obvious to mention. Furthermore, a balance of power between the colony and Iran in the region offers a larger margin of maneuvering for actual anti-imperialist forces.

More importantly, black-or-white approaches are very common, and limit themselves to oral statements of support or condemnation. We can shout we’re with or against Iran all we like—it won’t affect the balance of forces. Instead, we need to figure out our own political program, see where it aligns with Iran and where it doesn’t, and figure out what to do —not what to say— accordingly.

I’m interested in hearing both positive and negative opinions. Do you think Left Communism offers a better alternative to Marxism-Leninism, or do you think its criticisms of the Soviet model go too far? And which Left Communist thinkers or tendencies do you find most convincing, if any?

Um erro comum é pensar que ideologia = enganação, tipo "eles escondem a verdade da gente". Marx e depois Gramsci mostraram algo mais incômodo: a ideologia capitalista não esconde a exploração, ela naturaliza a exploração. Você sabe que é explorado e mesmo assim acha justo, porque "é assim que funciona", "todo mundo tem que trabalhar", "quem se esforça vence".

A meritocracia é o exemplo mais claro disso hoje. Ela não nega que existe desigualdade — ela justifica a desigualdade como resultado do mérito individual, escondendo que ponto de partida, capital acumulado e sorte pesam muito mais que esforço.

Isso é o que torna a dominação no capitalismo diferente da dominação por violência pura: ela não precisa de um exército em cada esquina porque o próprio dominado internaliza a lógica que o domina — e a defende.

Escrevi mais sobre isso aqui: oalienado.com.br/categoria/ideologia-alienacao — sem paywall, sem cadastro.

Im very ignorant on this topic, but from what I know this relationship is almost antithetical from the ones in China and in the USSR (in different ways), because in those the state had control over the bourgeoisie when in Russia those two are kinda linked, creating the oligarchy we know. Also, whats the difference between the chinese (and the ussr) state capitalism to a fascistic one like germany for example (besides idk historical context that makes them more supportive of the working classe)

(sorry for my english and for some possible misconceptions, just trying to understand!)

I am quite interested in spirituality: meditation, Taoism, using the I Ching for divination. These techniques are from a tradition of Eastern philosophy that I think is a primitive form of dialectical materialism (ie. the I Ching and Tao Te Ching describe the developments of an ever-changing interconnected universe). The main difference is that these philosophies view the developments of the material world as repeating in a circle, whereas Marxism sees development as occurring in a spiral (ie. things repeat, but they come back on a higher level.)

I found these spiritual practices very soothing, but since coming to Marxism I find I can't buy into them as deeply. Before, I understood them as the ancient wisdom of a philosophy that was superior to the mechanical formalism of modern capitalism. But now that I have accepted that history and philosophy does actually progress and develop, they seem like promising seeds that have become outdated, superseded by the work of Engels. And without these practices I find I'm becoming more irritable, less patient and generally have fewer ways to manage anxiety and stress.

Does anyone know of any spiritual practices created from a Marxist basis? I know I can read the works of Marxist writers, but that only lets me engage with this philosophy on an intellectual level. What I need is something based on these ideas that I can connect with on an emotional, intuitive level.

I’m a beginner, so I want to ask the Trotskyists: what is fascism according to Trotsky? Is the definition of fascism given by Dimitrov correct? Can fascism be called the highest form of Bonapartism? Does the idea of a strong state inherent in fascism contradict the interests of the big bourgeoisie?

I’m not well-read enough on theory to explicitly call myself a Marxist, but I am deeply anti-capitalist, socialist, and infuriated by hyper-consumerism. Growing up in a war-torn Middle Eastern country before taking refuge in Denmark (where I’ve lived for 11 years) gave me a very different perspective on how the world actually works.
Where I live now, many people exist in a comfortable bubble and assume we live in a corruption-free society where corporations and politicians can do no wrong. Today, I got into a incredibly frustrating 1v3 debate with my Danish coworkers after I simply stated that being a billionaire is fundamentally wrong.
Here are the arguments they threw at me, and where the debate fell apart:
"They earned it or inherited it" They claimed billionaires either worked exceptionally hard to earn every cent or just inherited it—which apparently excuses them from criticism. Bill Gates was brought up as the ultimate "good guy" example.

"It's just good business" When I pointed out how massive corporations crush competitors and trap workers, they brushed it off as smart business. "They're just making money, how can you blame them?"

"Workers aren't forced to stay" They insisted that in modern society, no one is forced to do anything, and if workers don't like their conditions, they can just quit.

"Poor people shouldn't have kids" When I argued that people can't just quit because they have families to feed, their response was: "If you aren't financially well-off, you shouldn't have kids." This idea that basic human experiences like parenthood should be reserved for the financially privileged was the absolute breaking point for me. When I argued that that was their point, they denied it and said that it’s stupid when people have kids, while not being financially able. Which on the surface is a fair argument, but we live in a culture where it’s morally looked down upon and it starts creating a system of classes, one where people have kids and one where people don’t have money. So no kids aren’t reserved for privileged people.

Because I didn't have specific stats or polished talking points on the spot, they treated "simple logic" as invalid, and I felt completely overwhelmed trying to fight off three people defending the status quo.
How do you effectively break through to people who are so insulated by privilege that they see systemic exploitation as just "good business"? What are the best, most direct arguments or concrete examples to use when people genuinely believe billionaires deserve their wealth and that workers can "just quit"?

I'm a socialist and have been reading Marx for a while now. What I still have trouble understanding is the idea that Marxism isn't a moral philosophy, but is rather a science. At a very general level, I get it -- I understand how moralistic discourse can be paternalistic and individualistic, which undermines the whole project.

But, that being said, at a deeper level, isn't class struggle rooted in a moral imperative? I.e. we see that the current system serves the few at the expense of the many, and that this is morally intolerable. Even in Marx's capital, he seems to engage in moral condemnation in his various descriptions of the exploitative nature of capitalism.

Another way of framing my question is: isn't it the moral claim that is the impetus for proletarian class struggle? without the moral claim, is there an impetus for class struggle? is the answer to this question that the impetus is not the moral claim, but rather a more elementary struggle for power?

Any guidance would be appreciated!

Well, since I'm the first, I'll start. To begin with, we'll probably define the system in the same way: first write the country from where you know, and then, for example, the YouTube channel (we won't list all the sites that have the same representatives) and then you can add what the authors focus on (Although this is not necessary)

since I live in Russia, I'll start with it, you can add, refute, and so on. Only with arguments and so on, we are not idealists.

Russia:

You Tube channels(Since it can show other people the video much more often)

1. "Простые Числа" - economics, as well as philosophy, I highly recommend it, especially since there are subtitles in English, German, and also, I'm sorry, I don't remember. A team of authors, for example Oleg Komolov, was also the author of the work Deglobalization

2. "Трибун" - the story (I don't know, but the most complete video about slavery in Sparta) is the analysis of the Black Hundreds, monarchists and Libertarians, as well as the author of the Yanturina channel wrote an excellent book about the analysis of myths about Stalin, the layout is still not too good, but the person is not making the hundredth book.

3. "Выход есть" - Vasily Sadonin's channelit focuses on general enlightenment and working with a young audience, but there are statistics, etc., as well as analyses of all sorts of idealists.

4. "Remi Maisner" - literature, podcast reviews, as well as a number of reactions, and campaigning in the form of short videos.

5. "Клим Жуков" -History, military history, and also statements on social topics.

I understand that there are a lot more of them, I just want to sleep already.

I’ve been reading Capital and I do not quite understand the argument behind commodity fetishism.

In particular, I do not quite understand how value appears as an objective property of a commodity instead of a social relation between producers mediated by the act of exchange.

It is because exchange makes it appear as commodities have direct relationships between them instead of indirect relationships between producers in the form of embodied labour?

Or is it because the producer has to take into account the value of a product before production (even though value is a social relation of crystallised abstract labour), since his livelihood depends on it? Making it appear as a property of the product instead of a social relation?

I would be grateful if someone could walk me through the argument!

Thank you!

Hi, looking to quote Sankara for an academic paper. Can someone find out where and when the following quote originated?

"Imperialism is a system of exploitation that occurs not only in the brutal form of those who come with guns to conquer territory. Imperialism often occurs in more subtle forms, a loan, food aid, blackmail . We are fighting this system that allows a handful of men on earth to rule all of humanity." Thanks