And I don’t obfuscate that I’m a communist. I’ll tell people that. Maybe not right away, but definitely at some point in the conversation. The reason I do that is because I want to show people that my values aren’t just “big government, no food”

I feel like it all the time honestly. One thing that has helped me at least have productive conversations is to ask people “why do you feel that way about Palestinians” or “why wouldn’t you travel to China?”

Then that opens the door a little bit more. Unfortunately, people get very offended when you approach it from “you’re wrong and here’s why” instead of “why do you feel that way?”

Well written post, comrade. I’ve recently been thinking a lot about this because I’ve lived the life of both an American conservative and American liberal.

Your assessment of Trump’s base is pretty accurate although I do there is a redpill component to it as well that has shepherded many young men to Trump who aren’t white. In the most recent cycle, his boom amongst Latino men was massive.

But again, the redpill community is hyper reactionary and sees female autonomy as a social ill

I didn’t know about the cattle tails but my God, there’s really no fucking reprieve for the Koreans from American aggression.

That makes a lot of sense regarding Cuba, too. It can take a long time for the soil to regenerate naturally without fertilizer

A big reason I think why the AES states struggle to produce food is that they have limited space for food production, especially since DPRK and Cuba have had to develop autarky, leaving even less available land for food production.

I’m not sure about DPRK because frankly, I have no idea where to look for reliable information about that country, but Cuba did shift to urban food production largely through the methods that you’ve outlined in your post and it seems as though it’s been modestly successful

Americans too. We had Hitler Youth camps all across the country. Henry Ford was a pen pal to the Fuhrer. Even when we were involved in WWII, we put Japanese people into our own concentration camps.

Greed is a powerful force. Even now, so many people have no qualms about doing outright destructive things to other people if they make a lot of money doing it. Capitalism encourages all of it too.

The more I read about Poland-Axis relations, the more disturbing it gets. The way the Nazis are portrayed as just some rogue movement acting alone is disgusting. They had many collaborators and bourgeois support.

How many times now have western economists predicted some major collapse in China? It’s getting silly at this point

We’re taught to ignore/fear the homeless. It’s not unlike the old Indian Caste System in that way. We look down upon them as if they are homeless because they’re addicted to drugs or because they’re lazy.

I’m an American and I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard the phrase “Don’t give money to the homeless, they’ll just use it to buy drugs”

My fear of death is mostly because I’m scared of leaving my wife and child in a desolate world where I can’t be there to support them, but at the same time, they are my biggest motivation for changing this world.

I don’t think you’re a coward, comrade. This is a very natural fear that we all carry with us at some point in our lives.

What helped me accept death is asking the question: “Would I really want to live forever?” Imagine immortality really. Watching everyone you know and care about die while you remain. Sounds like an awful existence to me.

Communism can only exist globally in a world without scarcity. So while I wholeheartedly accept socialism in one country, I think we have to acknowledge that China isn’t going to reach communism alone.

I do however think that Marxism is nothing if not constantly adapting or “reforming” to changing material conditions. So if the dictatorship of the proletariat remains, I think this is the only path towards developing socialism

I’m right there with you on Das Kapital. It’s basically an economics textbook and economic analysis on that level is really tough for me. I am resigned to the fact that it’s going to take awhile

This story in particular hits home so hard because I was very much plugged into the alt-right as a teenager and I grew up in such a conservative area that it wasn’t seen as such a big deal at the time.

It became obvious pretty quickly that the jokes were a cover for actual racism and hatred. Then I began the very long journey towards being a Marxist-Leninist. I can’t help but look back and shudder at what I could’ve been if I stayed in that horrible pipeline.

Democrats are so ridiculously out of touch that you have to stand in awe of how they cling to Obama era lingo while the Republican Party has morphed into a literal white nationalist movement.

Yeah she was a ML poli sci professor and I interviewed her for an assignment in a different class. I was a Bernie Bro at the time (lol). But I was already disillusioned by him because he kept referring to Joe Biden as “his friend”

She had a pictures of Lenin hung up all over her office. She recommended Stalin to me and I was a changed man after that

Das Kapital is such a dense text. I too haven’t been able to get through it. I remember being told as a child that Muslims hated me and wanted me dead and then I found out a good friend of mine in middle school was a Muslim which was one of my earliest awakenings.

Personally, I’ve been devouring Stalin’s books. Something about his writing style clicks so nicely for me. I will check out that book my Malcolm Harris! I’m fascinated by the history of labor organizing in the US that has been scrubbed from our history lessons.

I can relate to the autism, and political theory is definitely a special interest of mine. Neurodivergency alone was enough to make me feel completely alienated from my family and broader social group.