The most important thing to know about the PSL is that there’s a ton of misinformation and disinformation online from various kinds of sources. Find out for yourself what they believe and how they work by reading their websites and meeting them in real life. You can never trust what you hear online about communists.

It is a PPI and is used to treat GERD and ulcers. It definitely sounds like you have a lot to talk with your doctor about! I hope you get feeling better.

This person doesn’t have a materialist analysis and doesn’t show any kind of seriousness. This is the kind of cynical criticism that is common from online leftists who are disconnected with the real world.

No, I’m just talking about the ones you said you’re taking, ondansetron (for nausea), omeprazole (PPI, which is maybe what you’re calling anti-GERD, but it’s also used to treat ulcers), and maalox. These are all completely normal for the condition you’re describing. I don’t know what you were prescribed the Trintellix for, and it sounds like something you should definitely talk with your doctor about!

These medications are normal for your condition and pretty low-risk. It’s good you’re seeing a gastroenterologist soon, but I wouldn’t worry about continuing to take what you were given as prescribed.

The Mushroom at the End of the World by anthropologist Anna Tsing is really interesting! I enjoyed it.

This lines up with what I’ve seen from the UK. I wonder what it would take for some of you here to start your own party. I have never done something like that, but if you could connect with each other, you could volunteer with another organization together or simultaneously if you’re in different cities (any generally left organization, really) to learn some practical skills and help you evaluate social conditions while studying and preparing for launching your own org, and hopefully that would be enough for you to be able to approach it in the right way in a couple of years or so. It would take a ton of long-term dedication and discipline, but surely there are at least several people prepared to make the sacrifices necessary.

No, this is a libertarian magazine. You can tell by the slogan at the top. As cool as they’re accidentally making “republican socialism” look, they’re just average right wingers who are comparing Trump to socialists to insult him because they hate both.

I’m not Russian and don’t see a need to love or hate someone like Putin. It’s only important to have a material analysis of his decisions and the world situations he’s relevant to. Of course he has made made good decisions and bad decisions, and I think he’s kind of interesting because the social conditions of Russia are globally a bit unique right now, but that’s pretty much as far as my feelings on him as a person go.

I got the link directly from The People’s Forum, and donations go through them. They’ve been running projects like this for a long time. The campaign is also supported by most other major leftist organizations in the US.

What’s the connection between Reddit and this post?

Haha they say great minds think alike! It seems like a huge coincidence with the number of people here.

I keep coming across your username here lately, and I get so confused for a second every time

This is often an issue of how you communicate, and learning to communicate effectively with the working class is an important skill to develop (and can be difficult). Saying things that are so far ahead of where they are that they can’t understand is ineffective. Starting from points of unity and building trust are two of the most important things you can do, and persuading them to completely change their position happens over several conversations, not one. People don’t change their minds because you can prove you’re more right than they are; they change their minds because their lived experience of capitalist contradictions pushed them to look for alternative explanations, and you need to be a trusted person ready to guide them to the next step when they’re ready.

Oh boy. I can’t wait for people who bray about public health being a failure while ignoring steady defunding over decades.

Public healthcare is only a failure in capitalist countries for this reason. Without changing the social order, publicly funded healthcare is just a temporary concession to the working class, and when they take concessions away, they always tell us they was bad for us all along and that our suffering when they end is proof of that.

I have! It’s not extensive, but it’s a good overview of foundational educational concepts all Marxist-Leninists should know that you can build from. It’s pretty short and accessible. It definitely shouldn’t be the only thing you read on the topic, but I do recommend it.

I also find it really useful for guiding me in teaching these concepts to other organizers.

Yeah, and I think this is why they end up sounding ultra-left when they lack political clarity.

Yes, he has openly stated that he believes the PSL is “Dengist” and tells people to avoid it for that reason. He makes a lot of wild bad-faith claims about the PSL, and he has plenty of other very problematic and/or confusing views. I appreciate his work on the audiobooks, but it’s unfortunate that that gave him a platform to spread his own ideas. He should be a cautionary example of what happens when you read a lot without the kind of deep collective study and practical work that allow you to understand what you read correctly and stick to unfounded opinions rather than letting evidence change your mind.

If you can follow what you read, you are understanding well enough at this stage, especially if you’re not used to reading philosophy and how it works. You’ve barely started, and these are complicated philosophical concepts! You have some good reading recommendations here, and I would recommend trying to understand what they’re saying as well as possible (go slowly if you need to), but don’t worry about going beyond that yet. This is also a philosophy firmly rooted in real-life class experience, so organizing with your community will help you understand with time (and your study will make you a better organizer at the same time).

I think this just happens when they see problems with the current system (a natural consequence of living in capitalist society) but still dogmatically support it. Anarchism and “non-communist leftism” and “progressive” liberalism are useful to the capitalist state because they allow people to question and oppose what’s happening in our society but still come to the conclusion that almost nothing can be done. It’s not a big leap for people to say that imperialism is bad or that people’s basic needs should be met, but it takes a lot for masses of people to turn against ruling class ideology, so it’s expected that these kinds of leftist/liberal identities would be common in a capitalist society.