To be fair, I have no clue to who these people are, I don’t read the writings of any non-Chinese marxist besides Marx, Engels, Lenin (and maybe Stalin). I also don’t like the idea of linking increased literacy to willingness to learn.
Crowd-sourcing information is not a new idea, that’s how humanity has advanced, the internet does make it much easier, and with better translators it’ll be even better in future. The main issue is moderation as you mentioned, which goes back to having an authoritative person or group that most people can trust to delegate the tedious work of moderating to.
I also don’t like the idea of linking increased literacy to willingness to learn.
And never would I. But without literacy one is almost unable to educate themself independently. We’re not that far removed from a time where huge most colonised countries had less than half of their population able to read their own language. Now being able to read is basically compulsory for most professions or just living in urban areas in general. I see no point in propping up “big Marxists” if their resources don’t even have Spanish editions and people have to rely on those grifting translation editors with huge prefaces and postfaces that read like “but remember kids, communism is just a theory!”.
Again my issue is not with the concept of authority, but with conflating modern “English-language popularity” with it. Specially considering how inaccessible the “popular ones” actually are to the average world proletarian when compared to how developed the native-language capitalist propaganda machines have become. It just seems off to me to take the argument that “we should be careful about trusting individual self-proclaimed Marxists and instead should work more to propagate and organise the material that already exists” and make it about “anti-authority that leads to anarchism”.
Crowd-sourcing is not a new idea, but crowd-sourced encyclopaedias that fit on your pocket are. And there are many already-written books and articles (some written by Parenti and others) to get in there in an organised fashion, with other new resources such as hyperlinks, rather than hoping that yet another Ivy League economist (or worse, a Breadtuber) figures out new ways to say to Unitedstadians that Capitalism is a terrible system. That is work basically anyone here can do given enough free time. Capitalists have this obsession with making “the next big thing” when what we need is already there, and I don’t think we should fall for that trap too.
No ill will here, just thought my argument was being misunderstood there.
we should be careful about trusting individual self-proclaimed Marxists
I agree with this, which is why I don’t read or quote from them, but their work might be relevant to others which is why they seem popular.
and instead should work more to propagate and organise the material that already exists
marxists.org is a great resource but doesn’t actually have Xi Jinping’s work on it, or any of the past 3 Chinese leaders for that matter, even though they are available in Chinese and English from official sources. ProleWiki is what this site promotes, though more work is definitely needed.
To be fair, I have no clue to who these people are, I don’t read the writings of any non-Chinese marxist besides Marx, Engels, Lenin (and maybe Stalin). I also don’t like the idea of linking increased literacy to willingness to learn.
Crowd-sourcing information is not a new idea, that’s how humanity has advanced, the internet does make it much easier, and with better translators it’ll be even better in future. The main issue is moderation as you mentioned, which goes back to having an authoritative person or group that most people can trust to delegate the tedious work of moderating to.
And never would I. But without literacy one is almost unable to educate themself independently. We’re not that far removed from a time where huge most colonised countries had less than half of their population able to read their own language. Now being able to read is basically compulsory for most professions or just living in urban areas in general. I see no point in propping up “big Marxists” if their resources don’t even have Spanish editions and people have to rely on those grifting translation editors with huge prefaces and postfaces that read like “but remember kids, communism is just a theory!”.
Again my issue is not with the concept of authority, but with conflating modern “English-language popularity” with it. Specially considering how inaccessible the “popular ones” actually are to the average world proletarian when compared to how developed the native-language capitalist propaganda machines have become. It just seems off to me to take the argument that “we should be careful about trusting individual self-proclaimed Marxists and instead should work more to propagate and organise the material that already exists” and make it about “anti-authority that leads to anarchism”.
Crowd-sourcing is not a new idea, but crowd-sourced encyclopaedias that fit on your pocket are. And there are many already-written books and articles (some written by Parenti and others) to get in there in an organised fashion, with other new resources such as hyperlinks, rather than hoping that yet another Ivy League economist (or worse, a Breadtuber) figures out new ways to say to Unitedstadians that Capitalism is a terrible system. That is work basically anyone here can do given enough free time. Capitalists have this obsession with making “the next big thing” when what we need is already there, and I don’t think we should fall for that trap too.
No ill will here, just thought my argument was being misunderstood there.
I agree with this, which is why I don’t read or quote from them, but their work might be relevant to others which is why they seem popular.
marxists.org is a great resource but doesn’t actually have Xi Jinping’s work on it, or any of the past 3 Chinese leaders for that matter, even though they are available in Chinese and English from official sources. ProleWiki is what this site promotes, though more work is definitely needed.