Welcome again to everybody! Happy Lunar New Year. Make yourself at home. Go ahead and stand on that inconspicuous floor tile over there. In the time-honoured tradition of our group, here is our weekly discussion thread!
We have our own Matrix homeserver at https://genzedong.org, and a Matrix space; see this thread for more information.
Short reading list for new MLs here. To find theory (and other books), you can use z-lib, libgen, or Sci-Hub (for scientific articles). If an article is unavailable, try the Wayback Machine.
Some leftist people are so weirdly hostile without specific reason. On Lemmygrad, Reddit and real life. I’ve had multiple encounters, even here, where people just nearly insult me from the start instead of engaging in healthy debate lol.
I’d expect it from right wingers but especially communist movements, with their solidarity and shit, should know better?
Also, the whole ‘I’m the one true communist movement’ shit is just getting annoying right now.
End of rant.
Good faith discussion seems to have taken a hit here recently. Not nearly as bad as it was during the
patsoc purgebut it’s bummin’ me out. Part of the appeal of lemmygrad over other social media is I’m usually not anxious and ready to fight opening up the site, but learn and interact w/ comrades from around the world.Some topics just get really heated. Some for absolutely no reason imo.
I assume we’re being targeted by wreckers and reactionaries and try to refuse to get drawn in. This can be very difficult, but your comments in the recent LGBT/Iran thread are an exemplar. If we respond like this, as if everyone is acting in good faith but may be misinformed or simply incorrect, the bad faith actors will glow in the dark. Then we can educate each other and expel the shit-stirrers.
Edit: typo
Thank you, I really appreciate that and you’ve given me another reason to continue to try engaging that way. Social media is weird, discussions in comments sections between even just two people back-and-forthing with no other comments, it’s still implicitly impersonal. In the case of lemmygrad I’m seeing plenty of comments getting +20 updoots, tens of people could be reading and learning, or in the event of a bad-faith, name-calling session, cringing and feeling a bit alienated. I’d wager most users here are pretty passionate about their politics, and I get that, so it can definitely be difficult to rein it in (I have trouble w/ it as evidenced by plenty of my earlier comments), but I think it’s worthwhile to try.
Unless, you know, you’re talking to a genuinely fascist troll.
You’re welcome.
I changed my attitude to social media after reading Richard Seymour’s Twittering Machine. (FYI it could be triggering as it goes into some of the darker effects of social media.) He used to write a blog called Lenin’s Tomb. He’s insightful. I think he’s mainly on Patreon nowadays.
In TM he writes about how internet pile-ons happen so innocuously. An upvote here, a few downvotes there. Lots of people adding witty quips and one-liners. Most people aren’t trying to be bullies or trolls, but it can seem like that to the recipient because their timeline can go from empty to flooded with negativity very quickly.
With contentious issues… say person X says something liberal here… they’ll be challenged. It may be warranted. Sometimes the challenge can get quite personal and mean. Here’s the problem. If person Y steps in to point this out, it looks like there are now two sides. Not just a single wrong individual, but a battle over the sanctity of Marxism itself.
This them exacerbates things for person X, who really just needs to log off, but now they’re drawn in. I’ve participated in this myself, by accident. And that’s the thing – it’s almost always an accident unless there is, as you say, a genuine fascist troll. Thankfully they tend to be few and far between on Lemmygrad. (So much so that they become part of the lore.)
I don’t have many solutions, I’m afraid. Neither does Seymour, really. He’s not arguing to abandon social media. He offers an analysis to reveal the problems, which socialists can then try to fix. FWIW, these issues are far less prevalent on Lemmygrad than elsewhere. And these comments (and maybe threads like those in the People’s Court) are testament to our willingness to do something about such problems when they do occur.
I have four ideas that may help.
First, and this is a trick for reviewing other people’s written work, too, is to engage with and talk about the ideas and the text rather than the writer. Some people will still take things personally. Like news anchors who feel called out when someone questions a principle that is tightly wound up with their sense of self.
If we could consistently achieve what you did in the post I mentioned earlier, we might facilitate an atmosphere where everyone assumes good faith even in threads where there is a large rift. Lemmygrad already does better with this than many other places.
Second, is not to assume things about other users. This applies to general things as well as politics and I know I need to improve on this. I’ve started trying to clarify a detail or two rather than responding on the basis of an assumption. I think this can come across as being sarcastic, but I’m trialling it for a while.
Third, assuming questions are asked in good faith and are not rhetorical questions. Assuming that a question is a witty way to make a factual claim can lead very quickly to hostility.
Fourth, a Marxist solution may lie in Mao’s works. I became much more humble after reading ‘No Investigation, No Right to Speak’, for example. And it’s not a bad thing in general for comrades to learn to participate in constructive struggle sessions. Mao wrote some scathing criticisms of party members who failed to listen to the masses.
Sometimes a struggle session might reveal deep ideological differences that cause a split. But if every session does that, unity will not last long. So it’s necessary to build the capacity to have fierce disagreements and still to arrive at a unified position. This could be a disagreement over something very basic, like Marx’s conception of the commodity.
There is a way of guiding people, who might disagree with or misunderstand that conception. I realise that a party may not have time to handhold people through the basics, and will delegate education for new comrades, etc. But online, simply telling someone that Marxism means XYZ and any deviation is revisionism is unlikely to persuade them.
There still needs to be a point at which bad faith actors are banned, etc, and we need to be cautious of e.g. concern trolls. But among the good faith participants, the above ideas might help us. What do you and others think?
Couldn’t agree more with the great and well explained statement that you have made , very well said Comrade ❤️👍🏼
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I think you’re right.
IRL I used to tell people they need to do more research when they mentioned outrageous ideas to me. It backfires almost every time. Either they assume the suggestion is a rhetorical device to insult their intelligence. Or they go on to do some research and end up deeper in the rabbit hole.
Part of it is related to what you said about anti-intellectualism and liberalism. This results in an education system and a broader social environment that does not inculcate the way of asking the right questions. So for example if someone denies climate change and you tell them to do more research. They google ‘Is climate change real?’ or ‘Are climate change believers rational?’ etc. These questions are unlikely to lead to useful answers. People need to be taught how to ask questions.
Additionally, Google & Co partly builds its reputation on the ability to answer questions. We see this in the screenshot-memes, where someone has started to ask a question and the search engine suggests some ridiculous subjects. What many (perhaps most) people don’t seem to realise is that search engines don’t work like that. They’re not answering questions, they’re returning results with that phrase in the title, body, or metadata. People need to be taught how search engines work and how to use key terms to find general sources that still require interpretation and critical analysis.
I’m not saying any of this from discouraging people here from asking questions. Asking questions of other humans is very different to asking a search engine. And having a discussion about materials can be part of one’s ‘investigation’. This should be encouraged. In fact, I’d say ask questions before making claims and assumptions. A lot of the pain in online struggle sessions could be avoided by asking each other for clarification before ‘responding’ substantively.
Whether someone says something problematic or something that might require a broader re-evaluation of one’s own knowledge, yours are good questions to ask, I think:
“Why do you trust this source? What is their agenda? Who finances them?"
If you or others are interested, I wrote up a short(ish) guide on investigating / doing research a couple of weeks ago: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/481195.
Unfortunately, educational institutions and broader society fail to teach these skills. They perpetuate the idea that information simply needs to be absorbed. Bourgeois pedagogy reinforces this.
Have you heard of Bloom’s Taxonomy? For those who haven’t, it’s a pyramid of six skills, ranked from ‘understanding’ and ‘description’ through ‘analysis’, ‘criticism’, ‘evaluation’, to ‘synthesis’. The system (in some countries, at least) is deliberately structured on this basis. School-leavers who achieve the top grades are to reach ‘description’ by age 16 and possibly ‘analysis’ with some ‘criticism’. It’s similar for those who achieve the top grades at age 18, but slightly less description, slightly more analysis and criticism. Only the top university students are expected to be able to do the three higher-level skills.
(For any current pupils/students reading this: take a look at your assessment marking criteria and you’ll see these skills reflected within the relevant grade-boundaries. Working with this knowledge, you may find it easier to achieve the higher grades, which require a demonstration of the right mix of skills.)
There is some deviation, but these are the skills tested in examinations, and we know that many teachers (especially in the ‘better’ schools) teach to exams. At age 16, for example, 80% of the marks might be awarded for demonstrating understanding and describing the subject matter (depending on the criteria). This means the bulk of class time may effectively be set up to avoid the trickier higher-level skills; they distract the class from what they’ll be tested on.
Politically, it costs too much to test for criticism, it’s more difficult to rank the students and schools (which ranking feeds into an educational hierarchy), and the bourgeois tend to clash with critical workers.
I’m not trying to denigrate teachers, here. This is systemic. They have a lot to answer for, sure, but they need to be organised before they can do much about systemic problems. A lot depends on educational policy and the logic of that policy may not be explicit.
I see part of the task of modern Marxists as teaching these skills as well as Marxism. Fortunately, the task is made easier because if you can get someone to read almost any Marxist text, they will be tackling more advanced material than the majority of university students, who work mainly with extracts and summaries. Part of learning to be critical is seeing other people do it and working out how they did it. Bread and butter Marxism, really.
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Let me or any of the admins know if someone’s turning hostile, and we’ll issue temp bans.
More than anything I want this to be an enjoyable space, and part of that is comrades staying respectful when disagreeing.
Though the last point is mainly because I’m interacting with Dutch leftist groups who keep acting like that while not being able to plan three consecutive meetings.
This reminded me of this post, or rather the answers to that post. I understand that the post was really bad, but I find the comments way too hostile. Maybe I’m being too optimistic here, but maybe if people explained in a nice way pinkeston could have realized that they were wrong. I doubt anyone will go “oh actually you are right, my mistake haha” when met with such hostility.
Honestly, when I saw those responses to the post I felt betrayed… I didn’t think that the people I respect so much would suddenly become so hostile when seeing a bad take. It made me think for a while “What if I one day unknowingly post something that is so wrong that my comrades will do that to me?” Just thinking about it made me cry.
Makes sense. Re-reading it makes me see how hostile everyone is. Yes, it’s a weird take, but being that hostile was uncalled for.
I hope we can all keep learning in a good way instead of being attacked for not having the ‘right’ ideas.
Yo like what do these ancap dudes think will happen to their properties when they abolish the state lmao. Dudes gonna eat lead the moment the state stops guaranteeing their property.
I think that’s the plot to some of the metal gear solid games.
Lmao i think metal gear solid was the only video game that could get away with hour long dense cutscenes with no action.
I think cutscenes with action are the worst actually, like, I wanna play the action not watch my guy have fun in front of me
What did I just read
Everyone thinks they’ll be the survivor if they were in the Walking Dead. (Not me. I’ll be turned zombie from the get go. I’m far too slow in my human form. But, then, in not an ancap.)
For ancaps it’s even worse then people thinking they’ll be the survivor. Ancaps carry the burden of believing themselves to be exceptional. They probably think that if they were bitten they’d get Superpowers like Wesker from Resident Evil.
I feel a lot of well intentioned communists and leftists in general don’t understand the concept of primary and secondary contradiction
Do tell?
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Thank you
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Same, hopefully I’ll get there. Baby steps
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A primary contradiction is the biggest one and the one we should focus on, a secondary contradiction is a contradticion that we can think of in a later time, for example (as far as i understand it) in iraq a primary contradiction may be the U$ imperialism and occupation, and a secondary one may be iranian imperialism, its still bad, we should still condemn it, but it isn’t our primary objective at the moment.
(i am still new to this whole theory thing, this is the best summary i could make)
Thank you
Happy Lunar New Year
Amusingly, there was a post not too long ago on r/Sino lamenting how people are calling it Lunar New Year, instead of Chinese New Year, and calling it an expression of overall sinophobia
the reason I used “lunar” was because it’s celebrated in other countries as well, even if all/most are derived from the Chinese calendar
It’s not lunar though - it’s lunisolar. And there are other ‘lunar new years’ that happen on different dates. And what we got in the west is the Chinese version, essentially, as it was brought to us by Chinese immigrants.
I’m not saying your intentions were anything other than noble, but it’s worth being aware that in a wider social and media context, it’s a sinophobic rebranding by the US which I’m sure will spread to the wider western media landscape in the coming years.
Wait, is it a rebranding? The comments here are making it sound like a psyop when these terms have been used and continue to be used interchangeably all my life. This feels like the “Merry Christmas” vs “Happy holidays” crusade that conservatives wage every year.
Well the folks over at r/sino seem to think so, and I’ve seen one social media post specifically calling it ‘Korean New Year’ which is and extra weird choice. Personally I’ve never ever heard anything other than Chinese New Year in my nearly 4 decades on this rock, until this year. I’m willing to admit I’m spicy-mayo so I’m not the authoritative source though.
The one place I’d heard of a “Lunar Festival” was in World of Warcraft which, tbf, does not have a place called China. Their Lunar Festival is very much based on CNY though, albeit not tied to their in-world China expies, the Pandaren, but rather it’s a druidic thing, while Pandaren are incapable of being druids.
Was that user celebrating the Korean version of the event? Because afaik the holiday is common to all of East Asia with different countries having their own customs.
And I’ve never heard it called the “Lunar Festival” either, only “Lunar New Year” and “Chinese New Year”. But international video games often go out of their way to avoid namedropping real-life holidays so I’m not sure if we should be taking any stock in WoW. For example, Animal Crossing calls Easter “Bunny Day” and Christmas “Toy Day”.
I can’t find the original tweet I saw now, all I can get is Justin Trudeau calling it that. But yeah, my point was that it’s western governments cynically trying to detach the holiday from its roots in the west using ‘inclusivity’. They have zero interest in or care for other east-asian populations that adopted CNY, it’s purely a political maneouvre.
And yeah, I wasn’t slighting WOW, they’ve been saying Lunar Festival for almost 20 years and also don’t refer to Christmas or Easter (Winter Veil and Noblegarden respectively) and they even have Oktoberfest which they call Brewfest. I was only pointing out that that’s the only place, until this year, that I’d seen CNY called something else, and it was in a fictional universe.
Coming from a western politician, yeah it’s probably a geopolitical thing. But I don’t think everyone uses the term “lunar new year” as a way to distance themselves from China. Chicago Chinatown refers to the holiday both ways and that’s how I’m used to hearing it. I didn’t know it wasn’t like this everywhere.
Perfectly fair, I just thought it was funny
I’ve seen the exact opposite on Twitter from a pro-China account they said it was ridiculous to call it “Chinese” because to the Chinese it was called the Spring Festival and that a ton of other cultures were celebrating it
Pretty much, we call it the spring festival or just the new year. Guess it’s a different thing when it comes to the English expression of it lol
Debated on whether or not I should make a post about this, but I figured a comment in here might be enough.
So there’s talk about Instagram allowing topless women to post their photo’s soon. It actually sparked a debate in my socialist circles. I’m all for women doing what they want with their bodies and for not seeing nudity solely as something sexual, but I just know it will become a creep fest very quickly. I hope it can become a push in the right direction where women will be allowed to show their bodies and I hope it will spark a debate on sexualizing things like breasts but I’m also afraid it can backfire tremendously.
Anyone on here with an opinion on this? Was surpsrised to see a lot of debate within my circles, so I wondered if it did so in other socialist circles as well.
The amount of underage girls that use Instagram is astounding, and Instagram already doesn’t do any form of moderation or vetting on content creator’s ages and content. I fear this might lead to exploitation and child sexual abuse, or as an easy way for disgusting pieces of human shit to share cp. Or for those same creeps to encourage, pressure, and groom girls and young women into revealing themselves.
On the surface I agree with your hopeful points of women liberation, but this is multinational corporation that doesn’t have a single failsafe, moderation, or prevention plan. This can only backfire horribly.
I hadn’t even thought about that. That’s a very good an worrying point.
This is the first I’ve heard of it, but considering how sexualised Instagram already is, even without nudity, I cannot see this leading to any kind of healthy progress or discussion.
I don’t use Instagram, btw, partly for the same reasons that I avoid Twitter and Reddit. But also because it seems to be an especially concentrated form of commodity fetishism. I don’t think that’s a good environment for any meaningful discussion, including e.g. body positivity or the sexualisation of breasts, but maybe others see something in the platform that I don’t?
I mainly use it for keeping track of things happening nearby. I only follow political groups I’m active in, local bars/shops/events, some art stuff, some nature stuff and some people I know. I stay away from the memes and sports and news and celebs because I can’t be bothered with that honestly. I don’t feel like Instagram has problematic effects on me so imo there are healthy ways to use the app. But unfortunately it has done more damage than good.
That being said, I am all for stopping the policing of bodies, and mainly non cishet male bodies. It’s ridiculous that women get told what to show or what not to show. I remember when I was younger how at the beach people just couldn’t care. Lots of women were topless, people just dressed on the spot, no big deal. But I feel like with the rise of the smartphone and social media the whole body shaming, exposing, secretly recording, male creeping just got a steroid boost. And after more than a decade of Meta policing people’s bodies, a change in policy is at least somewhat of a postive step.
I don’t think women need to expose themselves en masse in order to be free or whatever, but we absolutely do need to bring back some form of normalcy to bodies.
My main issue is that, with Meta being an absolute shithole, it probably will not be the positive change it needs to be. A lot of damage has been done already. Not just to women, who would benefit more by being as sexualized as possible, but also to (young) men who have now been served a decade of hypersexualized and commodified women’s bodies at a rate previously unseen to people. They need to be re-educated as well, otherwise I fear that as soon as women post actual topless pics, they will just harass them even more.
To give an example of how Instagram ‘promotes’ women through their algorithm: I wanted to see how fast I could get my Instagram to recommend me dubious stuff. So I started at their explore page, which suggest content based on what you tend to look at. I found a picture of a woman who does running/swimming/hiking a lot, in a swimsuit. It was just a regular picture of a woman at a lake, nothing weird. But I started to go further from there. First it were similar pics of women doing the same stuff, still nothing weird. But I think after five minutes of scrolling my entire explore page was filled with women in underwear, women in extremely sexualized positions and actual straight up porn. It is such an unhealthy instance. For women that feel the need to do stuff like that, but also for men who get suggested that kind of stuff within minutes.
That makes sense. I know a few people who use IG to promote their work, so I can see how you could do what you do with a carefully curated feed.
If IG could be used to criticise sexualisation, that’s a good thing. I’m still a bit skeptical and think it could backfire. Partly because whatever wave of feminism we’re on today seems to be the political wing of the porn industry in the way it promotes sex work. Once some nudity is permitted on IG, there will be arguments to permit increasingly sexual images because ‘that is what women’s freedom needs’. I am probably overly cynical, though.
I think that’s a valid concern and I completely agree. Let’s hope this new policy will not turn into a sexualized movement as that’s the opposite of what it is supposed to mean.
I have a sneaking suspicion this move has absolutely fuckall to do with women’s rights or bodily autonomy or anything else. It has a lot to do with competition. It is a move designed to grab some of the audience from OnlyFans and Twitch. You know what I mean.
Ive become less visible online and off
But touching some severe grass, getting out there, picking up my life
things aren’t great, but okay, and thats nice.
Little by little, comrade. Glad you’re doing better!
Saw some absolute outrageous shit on Dutch state news some moments ago.
They interviewed a Russian couple that survived Leningrad because of the anniversary of its liberation by the Red Army. The woman just spat out: ‘you see Ukrainians on tv with swatsikas glorifying Nazis and suddenly we Russians are the bad guys?’
Absolute scenes, I nearly spat out my coffee.
wish i could see it
Something very very wrong is happening with pharmaceuticals all around the US right now. No one is saying anything and every organization is pointing fingers at each other, but there is a massive shortage of a huge range medication, ranging from Tylenol, Zyrtec, and Advil all the way to Adderall, Chemotherapy drugs, and Diabetes medication. People with debilitating illnesses and disorders like Type 1 Diabetes and ADHD are being left high and dry without any answers other then pharmacies saying that they are on “backorder” (I.e. They’re all out).
Its not just one company either, for example in the case of Adderall-Dextroamphetamine, in a worst case scenario it can be substituted with other drugs of a completely different makeup such as Vyvanse or Ritalin which are produced by a different companies. The one problem is that they are ALL out of stock.
Something is going very wrong and it seems like the US pharmaceutical industry is collapsing. I’m very scared what this means for people that rely on medication. Diabetes? Hormones for transitioning? Heart medication? Chemotherapy? What happens to those people?
How many of those meds were made in Germany?
I am not sure exactly, but I would expect a few at the very least. Apparently Germany is facing their own pharmaceutical shortage.
The vast majority of these medicines are also produced in the United States which makes things even more concerning.
I have lived in two countries in the last three years and traveled 20k total miles and just got Covid for the first time late last week. Bummer.
“The Americans, along with their satellites from Europe, are pushing the concept of a “rules-based world order.” Despite my requests over many years, none of my Western colleagues has ever explained to me what these rules are and where I can see them. They do not exist”
-Lavrov
“The Rules-Based International Order™, where the US makes the rules and orders everyone around”
Today I woke up in cold sweat after a dream of watching a Tu-22 bomber getting prepped for a nuclear strike. Fueled, missiles rolled out and attached.
Now I read the news about the weird purge in Ukrainian government and multiple countries (USA and Germany being main ones) promising to send hundreds of tanks to Ukraine. Plus McCarthy planning to go to Taiwan. Plus the ongoing dedollarization. Plus a new shooting in USA. Plus friends sharing photos of seriously weird, apparently quite jingoistic books being displayed front and center in bookstores in our city.
Sometimes it feels like communism should have won half a century ago. And that now it’s too late. That it’s one of those timelines, if you’ll excuse Hollywood speak.
It’s amazing watching liberals cheer on Zelensky purging his government but condemn socialist leaders for doing the same. Just amazing.
I can’t even joke about it, it’s so dumb
hundreds of tanks to Ukraine
No, Britain’s sending 14 and Germany and the US aren’t sending that much more. Denmark has sent literally all of its Archer howitzers, and the Abrams can probably get one-shotted by a Kornet
Edit: it seems that when we extend the time frame for two years, the total planned tank donation number 200, but that’s not anytime soon (and Rheinmetall, separate from Germany, is giving more tanks than everyone else combined).
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Isn’t it kinda weird how like everyone insisted that the Ukrainian government is fine and then Arestovych accidentally reveals that the collapsed apartment building was caused by a missed Ukrainian airdefence missile and now almost anyone who could have been one of his allies is suddenly getting investigated for “corruption” and he’s been fired and 14 VIPS mysteriously died in a “helicopter crash” a week ago where the helicopter was already on fire before it crashed into the kindergarten and now Zelenskyy has a scapegoat for all the missing Western donations?
Folks over at Reddit think it might be a pretext for an open US involvement, like in Vietnam
Saying the quiet part out loud
Smartest American journalists be like
By Gawd, not the good red-blooded AMERICAN BOIS!
So, when Ukrainian sources claim that the Russians have been driven back from Ugledar by a “massive counterattack” that never happened, it’s just the “fog of war”, but when a Russian twitter user predicts that a city will fall in 24 hours but it actually a few extra days, its “lying”?
I’m reasonably sure that, by definition, a prediction cannot be a lie
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