Thank you for the time and effort you put into this response, and I apologize for my late response. I do promise that I’ve had a tab open on your reply and its just taken me way to long to get back to it.

However, you do approach this topic from several very interesting angles that I will definitely be keeping in mind as I move forward.

For the college radical org, sadly most of those exist mostly in particularly major and massive colleges, as in smaller colleges communist orgs are sadly nonexistent or just a three man trot book club at best. For this reason if I were to commit to the idea of a communist organization and be certain of that idea; I would need to commit to a party in full, for better or worse.

The “pipeline” you mentioned seemed like it would be soul sucking at best and would risk to much in the long run, so I feel like just skipping the middle few steps and jumping right to a liberal position like Dem, or SocDem for cover might be safer. Seeing as how the US is trending “left” ever so slightly, and I might be able to better utilize Marxist ideals under a cover of a more palatable movement when I will be in my educational/career infancy, and unable to risk being an out and about ML.

Overall, the part about the US Intelligence is probably mostly correct, as there is no way to know what they are actually planning and thinking about anything at any given time. As you mentioned to however, I doubt they would care much unless I present any sort of actual threat, like Fred Hampton and Parenti. However, I feel that joining any sort of actual political work would be seen as a threat, and all that would need to be done is tossing my application in the garbage to throttle any and all chances of movement. Which is why the cover and “subterfuge” is important to me for the beginning.

I do agree fully with the social media line however, and I have done my best to completely limit that. I have no Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, Tiktok, or Facebook accounts, so my internet footprint is already very limited, and I never use personal emails for anything as employers have pretty cool but dystopian programs that allow them to throw emails in and see every associated account to website that email has been used for. I also see the larger internet as a pretty poor battleground for anything related to organizing or ML thought, so needlessly exposing myself seems foolish.

I also agree with the socializing line as well, and while I may be an ML at heart, I don’t wish to make that my whole personality and conscious. I have other interests, traits, hobbies, and aspirations, so I don’t see myself ever wanting to overbearingly throw ML into every conversation as if I am some ultimate authority that must be followed or else. Most of my worry is with the admissions officers and actually getting into university, and how this might impact them; or how far the might dig.

Also I would argue very much that the “volunteer” organizing is not cynical at all and should be a crux of organizing along with labour organizing and ML thought. As hey, I feel like people would definitely listen more to ML thought if they aren’t starving, and can get their rotten tooth fixed.

What did catch my attention was your last paragraph, and I do hope I can live up to that ideal, as I know it is a long road ahead, but one that I can traverse with comrades, friends, family, and hopefully future supporters, all by my side.