It is true that they are not worse than the CPUSA. But just because they produce good “takes” doesn’t make them worthy of critical support. They may have good ideas surrounding geopolitics, but their “critical” support (or lack thereof) makes them more prone to chauvinistic stances which are displayed within the takes of the Russian Federation. It may be more correct than the CPUSA’s international stance, but they’re both social chauvinists on different levels.

Let’s not forget that patsocs initially “critically” supported Trump, who was deemed an anti-imperialist (or at least his actions were anti-imperialist) by Hazites, and likely the same by those who follow MWM or Hinkle. Just because the party statement rejects both parties doesn’t mean it won’t likely remain that stance. CPUSA claims to not be a puppet of the democrats yet in their twitter they claimed to be “small d democrats”. Their tailism is a product of their chauvinism, they believe that the masses have nothing wrong with their thoughts, of being transphobic, homophobic, etc. That’s revisionist, and just because they leech the working class from the republican party doesn’t mean those chauvinistic thoughts go away. If anything it may be reinforced.

Also, critically supporting them for the sake of accelerationism is not going to do much. The regard for “chaos” at the cost of trans, gay, and black people would be more costly for them rather than for the cishet whites (or Conservatives to be more specific). This is not a party worthy of support, by any measure, as supporting them is supporting the same social-chauvinistic stances which Lenin initially opposed.

Everytime someone says “Das Kapital”, it is more likely that person is either not a marxist or is beginning to understand marxist theory. Every marxist who cites Capital refers it as Capital, with its volume next to it. “Das Kapital” is just the original text of the German release, which there is an English edition which calls itself Capital, because we don’t call it “The Capital”.

Wow people read. But they don’t actually apply the knowledge. The fact this person refers to “Das Kapital” instead of “Capital” shows their lack of expertise. I bet they haven’t even read all the 3 volumes, which each one of them is about a thousand pages or so. You can claim you have read a “book” if you only read the first 10 pages. That’s literally what they do with Adam Smith’s “Wealth of Nations” book. Despite the book supporting the Labour Theory of Value, liberals claim it to be pro-capitalist because they only read the first 8 pages.

The Communist Manifesto is so easy to read I don’t think anyone should flaunt about it. And then they state that the Jewish Question is more “antisemitic” despite its dual-character nature of presenting both sides, one which defends the Jewish people in its first half, and makes a caricature of the anti-Jewish people in the other. This is what happens when a metaphysical person reads a book which is intended to be read from a dialectical point of view. Deeply unserious. Don’t say you’ve read it until you actually apply the knowledge.

Down wit cis

“Members of the party were average people who didn’t take part in the genocide”

They knew what the fuck they were signing up for. They’re not stupid. I hate the narrative that those who follow conservative/fascist mindsets are sheep, because that isn’t true. If you follow nazism, you are a nazi. That is it. If you follow an ideology which does an action at the expense of oppressed groups, that isn’t “being average”. That’s just taking advantage of privilege. I can’t believe people would dumb down nazis and conservatives as sheep.

Aussig supports the Shining Path. But I don’t think the distinction matters much in this case. She claimed to be a maoist in the discord server.

Edit: This statement is corrected because I’ve later learned that this isn’t true from Aussig. However as I stated earlier, the distinction doesn’t matter much. She’s still an ultra. Everything else is correct.

Aussig is irrelevant in general, but her contributions had lead to the Prolewiki accounts being banned. She just took advantage of the vandalism and used it for her own purpose. I can personally confirm that Aussig is not a sock puppet account, especially given she was participating in the discord server not in the same way as Parabola (Wisconcom). She was a part of the scandal but for different reasons.

I think Parabola made a larger dent into Leftypedia that will take harder to scrub off compared to Prolewiki. Especially given at the rate the articles are being changed (Literally productivity has been cut in half since Parabola is gone, only leaving Harrystein to edit the wiki), we won’t see Leftypedia recovered.

This is because Parabola (Or Wisconcom perhaps) originally introduced the idea of a leftypedia discord server in the matrix server, and so Parabola was the official owner. That means that Parabola has all official access to the discord server since he is at the top.

In my month staying in there, it is a gold mine of bullshit, I have amassed a collection of screenshots which clearly show that leftypedia is a place where left unity cannot happen.

Also, you have posted that link about Harrystein linking it to Wisconcom. I think Parabola is actually Wisconcom, given he made sock puppet accounts after his ban, and I’m one of the few people who can judge his tone and voice in voice chats since I heard it before when I was a part of the study group.

Since Aussig and Parabola are banned, I doubt Leftypedia would stand up again.

I had a conversation with one of the members of the Leftypedia discord server before my ban yesterday (whom I will not reveal the identity of), and they stated that Parabola has stepped down as administrator.

I thought there would’ve been more chaos at the discord server, surprisingly it was the opposite. It seems everything happened at either the editor’s side or at the admin’s side.

What is clear is that Aussig states through paraphrasing their words that:

They said they don’t want Leftypedia to be for all Leftist peoples.

In other words, Aussig has directly stated that leftypedia does not want to be leftypedia. They have banned all “revisionist” tendencies including 3 prolewiki accounts that only existed to tackle the issue with Wisconcom existing on the server.

Leftypedia has become a failed experiment it seems. The split between the Hoxhaites and Maoists (Aussig was a maoist when she entered the server* and I know it from my days in that discord server) is real. I’m not surprised at the very least. Parabola kept shitting on anarchists, even banned an anarcho-egoist (or minarchist, doesn’t matter) because they were reactionary and espoused anti-marxist views.

In the short amount of time I’ve been on that server (which is a month I think, a few days after the server’s creation) it was clear that this server would break down. It’s a funny coincidence that breakdown happened the day after I was banned for being “hostile”.

EDIT: Made corrections, see points marked by a *.

I bet even the editors are laughing over the transcript:

[Editor’s note: Biden appeared to mean Xi here, not Putin.]

How the fuck can you confuse them? Actually I’m not surprised at this point. Biden must have dementia at this point.

deleted by creator

I don’t have it in front of me but I remember a Stalin quote saying something quite different in the case of supporting anti-imperialism in West Asia despite the social conservatism.

And that somehow applies to the United States as well? Two different regions with two different material conditions. Why do you insist on downplaying MAGA Communism and its potential effects? It does bring people toward Fascism by introducing a “Socialist” mask, not unlike the Nazis or more close in representation the Strasserists. Also it’s interesting you didn’t address the Lenin quote. You just said there exists a quote which Stalin said it debunks that. Both quotes can be true simultaneously as they are not mutually exclusive. You still haven’t considered that quote. Again, just because they claim to be “anti-imperialist” does not mean we should support them.

I’ve never suggested supporting these groups, but you respond as if I have and then question my character which has nothing to do with an analysis of the topic at hand.

I accuse you because you seem to downplay these groups rather than uphold them. You forgot the “critical” part of “Critical Support”. Also I never said that marginalised peoples don’t have rights. I said this: “I ask again, do you not want us to have rights?” I address you directly because you seem to want to downplay marginalised groups in the name of “Anti-imperialism”. You claim it to be a “discussion” around the characteristics of fringe political movements, which is incorrect. What you are advocating for is downplaying the fascistic nature of Patsocism even if that is not your very intention.

The other person in this thread communicates without all the hubris while still having the exact same positions you have, I’d recommend looking to their writing for some examples of how to communicate in a way that is actually effective at getting your points across.

I write in a different way from him. That’s perfectly fine. I do tend to accuse you a lot but that’s because I tend to read between the lines more often and tell you what is wrong. I don’t want to become him. Nor will I ever. I don’t understand how that is relevant to our discussion.

I didn’t claim that conservatives will suddenly be cleansed of their reactionary nature by adopting stances that don’t promote war against China or Russia.

Maybe you didn’t, but you did claim that introducing Conservatives to supporting China and Russia would suddenly make them more “anti-imperialist”: “As far as the social conservatism goes, they are appealing to people who already have those sentiments but bringing them into a frame of reference that is anti-imperialist.” Why did I call this removing reactionary sentiment? Because anti-imperialism is inherently progressive (i.e. progresses towards socialism). Yet their reactionary nature still remains.

I’m asking why some MLs here are so scared of what they claim is an irrelevant fringe group for trying to appeal to people that have the same identities as they do to take anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist positions. Wouldn’t that be better than them having imperialist and capitalist positions? Would it be any worse for the US political landscape for them to try?

Let’s just say Conservatives (for some unknown reason) are willing to support China and Russia. Why do they do this? Because they do it for their own benefit. They support China and Russia only, and only because it’s contrarian to the Democrat position of opposing China and Russia. Is it truly anti-imperialist if they do not actually care for the support of a nation? Furthermore, would these positions further cement their conservative positions? It most likely will. Conservatives rarely change their stance, if ever, because they benefit the most from the capitalist system, or they believe in fundamental ideas because they are usually petit-bourgeois or live in rural regions. Of course this is all hypothetical. Most Conservatives don’t even support Communism, and MAGA Communism isn’t a popular trend with Conservatives.

I’m just confused about why you all seem to be so afraid of them to the point that you say they are nobodies but also put a lot of energy into making sure everyone knows how much you hate them.

I’m willing to concede that, yes, the Patsocs (at least in this discussion) are an extremist group. But just because they do little damage doesn’t mean they don’t do damage at all. Overall in the grand scheme of things, they are just a rehash of what Lenin called ‘social-chauvinists’ in Russia. If Lenin needed to tackle the social-chauvinists of the Great Russians, then we must tackle the fascistic nature of the White Settlers. Both are similar (in fact they are the same, with only the difference being location), so we must tackle the latter.

I’ve never met a MAGA communist but I’ve seen a lot of Anarchist and Maoist and DemSoc wreckers co-opt movements and struggles and turn them into popularity contests, social clubs and cults of personality.

Yes. We can tackle both. We must put efforts on both sides as they are left and right deviations (of the extreme kind). Unfortunately you fall into the right deviationist bracket by assuming that Patsocs don’t do as much damage. They can, and often do. Again, struggle against both sides. You forget to understand that MAGA Communists tail behind the masses, following their every word even if it is not right. That is not what marxists do. Marxists must convince the masses of socialism. Tailing behind them won’t work.

Conservatives and Liberals already understand that they live on stolen land

You’d be surprised how even ‘socialists’ make mistakes of people not apparently being settlers just because they were born it. Many Americans think they are not settlers. In fact, they deserve to live on the land they have because they were born in it. For the minority that do think they live on stolen land, they think Settler Colonialism is long gone or something along those lines.

“the people MUST be convinced to believe what I believe because it is correct,” which flatly ignores the material conditions of those very people.

I never said that. I said we must convince the masses that socialism would be more advantageous for them and thus they would be able to support socialism. However with those very people, we must convince them of their settler mindset, and make them understand that they live on stolen land. It is a fact that they live on Stolen Land, yet if they ever feel that their safety is threatened, they are settlers which do not want to support socialism. It is not only I who believe it is correct, but Lenin too. Indigenous people have a right to self-determination.

Just because it is the right position doesn’t mean it will ever take hold in this country

If it won’t ever take hold in this country then the United States would remain a settler nation even under “socialism”. There is no socialism where the oppressor nation continues to exist and oppress the oppressed nations. You’re being defeatist again. In fact you are supporting settlers with this argument. Decolonialism must be supported by all settlers, full stop. If that cannot be achieved, then we will not have socialism. It is not optional to skip Decolonialism. By skipping it, we do not have socialism.

feels like they are trying to channel Lenin

I am just asking you questions regarding your defeatist mindset. Is that a fair question to ask? If not, why?

Whatever is channeling within your post is doomerism. Do you not have a sense of revolutionary optimism? I am not saying we will manufacture a revolution quickly, rather that we need revolutionary optimism such that we can see work being done. Just because you claim to be a materialist, does that mean you must channel your doomerist attitude?

I think it is really foolish to assert that fighting back in and of itself means success is assured.

I never said this. I also never said anything in that paragraph.

I haven’t seen any of the other things you’ve claimed here and have acknowledged this is new content to me

Patsocs tend to poke fun at “wokeists” i.e. LGBT people because they think transgenderism is bourgeois. It has plagued the patsoc movement which we must consider. Again you seem to downplay this. Is it because you do not know? Or is it because you have underlying intentions? I don’t know either way but you are downplaying. I address you directly because that is the purpose of your argument. You seem to downplay marginalised people and downplay Patsocs as well for the name of “anti-imperialism”. If you don’t know anything about Patsocs, read this Prolewiki article as a first basis.

I see Libertarians advocating for microtransactions as it is “how the consumer spends that benefits the corporation” bullshit.

Instead of Libertarians seeing capitalism advancing towards the usual notion of maximising profits, they just see as consumers helping the corporations and thus it should be perfectly legal to do so. Games become worse due to their “efficiency” (efficiency meaning to extract as much profit as possible) by laying off employees, replacing them with contract work, utilising microtransactions, especially if the game is Free to Play. Did this all happen when the consumer spend their game or was it due to the capitalist because he wanted to maximise profits?

The libertarians argue “They should just stop spending if they don’t like the company!” but this doesn’t explain why capitalists make a tendency towards maximising profits. Then they argue about " ““social”” enterprises " and whatnot. In other words, what they explain (i.e. the products consumers buy), doesn’t explain the general tendency of capitalism, nor political economy in general.

This means that these libertarians have nothing to explain. Their arguments don’t explain anything. They don’t explain capitalism. Selective Apathy is nothing more than ignorance. They don’t care about other people, they only care if they are not affected, or if this practice helps them in some way or another. This line of thinking of “I don’t care what you do” can be extrapolated to many horrible ideas that libertarians or liberals can cling on to. We can also argue this is an aspect of alienation, but I made my point. This is just another aspect of individualism.

Again, as a person just hearing about this guy, I am reading his quote and reading what you say he means and it seems to be the opposite of what he says…

I don’t disagree with the quote. What I disagree with is this statement: “If Modern day Western communists lived in Russia they would have tweeted pictures of the Bolsheviks reaching out to the black hundreds and demanded that people cancel them for it.”. Source This is what Smith was advocating for. It is not a question of having a “pretty cemented perspective on this topic” but how words are used. This is not semantics. This is just what reaching out means. What Eddie Smith argues is what I said earlier, so I won’t repeat it again.

As far as the social conservatism goes, they are appealing to people who already have those sentiments but bringing them into a frame of reference that is anti-imperialist.

Not all anti-imperialists should be supported, quote Lenin;

Imperialism is as much our “mortal” enemy as is capitalism. That is so. No Marxist will forget, however, that capitalism is progressive compared with feudalism, and that imperialism is progressive compared with pre-monopoly capitalism. Hence, it is not every struggle against imperialism that we should support. We will not support a struggle of the reactionary classes against imperialism; we will not support an uprising of the reactionary classes against imperialism and capitalism. Source

Supporting conservatives for “anti-imperialism” is not anti-imperialism but rather the opposite. You are directly siding with conservatives rather than the general masses (or in this case the proletariat). You completely ignored my statement which was this:

Then why support them to begin with? Do you not care for trans people (as I am), or feminists (as I am), or black people? All of whom are oppressed because Conservatives don’t want us to have rights?

I ask again, do you not want us to have rights?

If they didn’t somewhat appeal to the “US identity” and all the chauvinism that comes with it, the messages wouldn’t get through the gates, but could they be inoculating progressive ideas into the white working class by not presenting in a way which totally alienates them from even beginning the conversation?

What identity should communists appeal to? The US identity is born out of a white settler identity. That is a fact which most settlers refuse to understand. Just making white settlers support Russia or China isn’t enough to rid themselves of their reactionary nature. Conservatives (and Liberals too) need to understand that they live on Stolen land and thus they need to support decolonisation in full. For a US communist working for a decade, this is shocking to hear. Instead of paralleling communist ideas, convincing the masses that socialism is superior to them, you instead compromise your position with conservatives. There shouldn’t be any compromises when your own ideology is at risk with such compromise.

Next I see you wallow in your defeatism with: “It’s not like we are actually going to organize revolution in the next few years”, “honestly I don’t see anything else really working very well in this country yet”. What is it are you doing then? You see the troubles within your very country yet you don’t fight back? What have you been doing for a whole decade to let yourself wallow in this?

so whats the problem with these guys trying to convince settlers to back off on China and Russia and place the blame with billionaires?

Are they truly going to blame the billionaires? No they will blame the so-called woke left which is what we are. They argue that ideas like transgenderism are bourgeois, and yet you seem totally quiet about this. With anti-LGBT and racist sentiment, you don’t care as long as it is “progressive”.

Speaking of Trump, I haven’t seen anything of these guys saying to vote for Trump, can you show me that?

Many patriotic socialists call Trump “anti-imperialist”. He isn’t. The strategy of Patsocs is that they vote for the Republicans as they are also “anti-imperialist” and back MAGA. However some patriotic socialists argue there are RINOs! So even if I haven’t shown that they will vote Trump, they still argue that Trump is “anti-imperialist” and so is MAGA “Communism” in general.

They seem to have just launched some sort of org recently, I watched Hinkle’s speech from it and he had the crowd of white people cheering Hamas and listening to quotes from Lenin.

“They quote Lenin so they must be anti-imperialist!” I’ve seen many revisionist organisations quote Lenin in part or not at all or leave parts out. This doesn’t mean they are anti-imperialist in any way.

I consider DSA and Bernie to be reactionaries at this point but I can’t say I don’t know many good comrades who went from apolitical -> DSA/Bernie -> MLs and I see the value of that.

I have also seen conservatives scream against Bernie as he is apparently a “socialist”. Good for you that comrades seen Bernie and became MLs. What I care for is the opposite reaction which can also be caused. Conservatives are against Bernie and thus they won’t be MLs, or at best Patriotic “Socialists” or there will be MLs who are sympathetic to the Democrats or Bernie just because he has some “socialist values”. You may not be well in-touch with Patriotic Socialism, but if you are a US communist, please, please understand it is a backwards ideology that must not be supported.

Did you read what he wrote in the linked thread?

Yes. Prolewiki has too. What Eddie Liger Smith is arguing is that we don’t convince them of their reactionary ways but rather adopt them. That is what ‘reaching out’ means. We do not ‘reach out’. We convince them of their reactionary views. Smith doesn’t seem to agree with this proposition.

Therefore, would it be more practical to steer these american labor aristocracy workers towards a movement like MAGA communism?

Somehow you gotten everything correct and then you decide to say this. No. MAGA Communism is a reactionary movement. By bringing people towards MAGA Communism, you’re introducing reactionary sentiment. MAGA Communists are not progressive in any sense. By stating it is the case that we should convince people of a backward, reactionary sentiment, of which imposing “patriotism” to the reactionary masses, means that you are advocating for reactionary sentiment. Please read up Prolewiki’s article on Patriotic Socialism.

Aside from MAGA communists generally seeming like transphobes, misogynists, and potentially racists

Then why support them to begin with? Do you not care for trans people (as I am), or feminists (as I am), or black people? All of whom are oppressed because Conservatives don’t want us to have rights?

When it comes to anti-imperialist nations, we tend to accept their social conservatism under critical support because we understand that they are the product of their conditions, but when we see anti-imperialist Americans who have similar social conservative views, we reject them entirely for it and call them fascists and feds.

Their social-conservatism is a result of domestic action. We should still, and rightfully, criticise those nations for being anti-LGBT. Critical support does not mean ignorance. It means criticising the nation (for being capitalist, anti-LGBT) and supporting its international actions for anti-imperialism. This does not apply to Conservatives because the US imposed cultural imperialism onto the third world, thus making the third world less likely to adopt LGBT ideas because it is seen as a “western” thing. You’re comparing two different things. In either case, we should combat the anti-LGBT sentiment.

(Hinkle has gained 2 million followers since 2019, PSL has almost 100k since 2009).

Follower counts mean nothing. Just because more people follow it doesn’t mean it’s good. PSL has actually been doing stuff, what has Hinkle been doing? Pretty much nothing. He tried to communicate with the third world but it results in failure because no one cares about him.

If the option is between status quo and MAGA communism, because americans are not willing or interested in a full bolshevik style revolution, isn’t MAGA communism better for the rest of the world?

No. This is no different from lesser-evilism. MAGA Communists don’t even have their own party. They just tell you to vote Donald Trump because he is supposedly “anti-imperialist”.

Is there potential that, like DSA and Bernie, this group could be a wide funnel into the left that could result in some sincere right wing conversions?

I’ve seen this argument before and it can be debunked by stating it can have the opposite reaction. Sure it may bring new “leftists”, but it would also dissuade people from “leftism”. Hence why I don’t support the DSA or Bernie, especially given both of them support imperialism.

Beyond that, wouldn’t it be better for folks like us to be engaging and disagreeing openly with MAGA communists to provide the people attracted to their ideas

Yes. We should. And we did. And we will continue to do so. Patsocism isn’t a dying trend, but it isn’t necessarily one that gains traction with conservatives. You can literally think the same way. Conservatives don’t like Communism. Therefore Conservatives won’t support MAGA Communism. Therefore this movement, as big as it sounds, it’s a fringe and extremist group, one which requires further analysis than looking at the surface.

“Slave Labour is only right if it is done in my country” -Braindead American

Why am I not surprised. I remember one time Eddie Smith (One of the folks of the MWM team) had the idea to “criticise” Prolewiki on twitter because we called him out for supporting the Great Russian Black Hundreds (and therefore fascists).

MWM is a patsoc shithole which aims to be the “middle ground” between the extremist patriotic “socialists” (Hazites) and the “Ultra-leftists” (Marxist-Leninists in this case), which at the end of the day proves nothing because he sides with patsocs to begin with.

Also funny that he pulls the patsoc trope of using AI art. Long paragraph full of word salad combined with the AI art picture in the end basically shows what an average patsoc is, an overglorified gish galloper.

Gaming is one of the biggest and most profitable industries in the world

It is, but the profit doesn’t come from sales, but rather recurring systems as a result of battle-passes or one-time purchases for microtransactions. I said virtually unprofitable because a lot of multiplayer games are now free-to-play, take any game, Call of Duty, Halo, etc. Most likely there is a free-to-play game available in the multiplayer sector. With that multiplayer sector, they are now gaining revenue not from sales (as it is impossible), but rather from recurring payments or microtransactions. Therefore most of the revenue that comes from games today is not from sales of a particular commodity (Note that when you purchase a game digitally, you do not own the game, you own the lease for a (supposed) indefinite amount of time, therefore it cannot be considered a ‘sale’ since you do not own your game), but rather the payment of certain cosmetics or a battlepass which is only available within that specific game. You do not own the cosmetic, you just own the lease to it.

When you shift your focus from ‘owning’ a game (as it is a lie for PC gamers, for console gamers, it makes a bit more sense), it is clear that revenue now is generated not from a game sale.

The developer that participates in cyclical layoffs (read: the average publicly traded one based in the US) is more of a failed capitalist.

The corporations that run most of the game market (Ubisoft, Activision Blizzard, Valve, etc.) are not headed by one person. They are held by shareholders, i.e. capitalists, not a single capitalist. Shareholders do not care about the quality of a game, rather how much revenue it generates. If it does not generate more profit than the last game, then there will be consequences despite the game being profitable (from sales or otherwise).

Franchises have been worth billions each since Guitar Hero, ruining them to reduce short-term company expenditure is shooting yourself in the foot.

Guitar Hero is a dead franchise, for the most part. A lot of franchises are dead. Why is that? They’re not profitable enough to keep themselves running. No one aside from Guitar Hero fans wants to play Guitar Hero. Any franchise you can think of, Call of Duty, Assassin’s Creed, Battlefield, these are being milked, because it is a safe bet. Even a singleplayer experience like Assassin’s Creed has microtransactions. And their game instead of centering around a fun experience, it is centered around wasting your time as much as possible or force yourself to do side quests so that you can get the level you want. Not only that, most of the Assassin’s Creed games require a third party DRM tool, and tampering with your game may result in your account being suspended, or your game gone all together. This is the turn-around we see for games. Games are not calculated per sale, as it is useless (or often a minority in the game’s revenue all together) but rather how much money it can accumulate based on microtransactions, battle-passes, etc.

If this is an effect of capitalism, it is only insofar as US capitalists have the leeway to fuck around and find out, because what they find is still profitable (largely due to complacency of gamers). But that leeway is a product of regulatory failure.

This is liberal speak. I’m astonished that you can say this and not see that capitalism is to blame. Every capitalist is concerned with one thing, profit. I already said what I said earlier, that being that capitalists care about how much revenue it generates. It is not based on regulatory matters, rather how much capitalists have control over how people play games and consume their product. Saying that is an effect of regulation and not capitalism is advocating the same as social-democracy, removing the “bad” aspects of capitalism whilst still keep capitalism in place.

It’s ridiculous for workers to be thrown aside to boost profits when this purpose isn’t actually achieved.

I provided two links which shown the exact opposite. Please, do some research.

Prioritising profits doesn’t suddenly turn you into a rabid animal that would give up $5 in 5 minutes for $1 right now.

EA laid off 670 employees just recently, yet shareholders have reached a profit of $1.5 billion It is clear that with this strategy, combining with the fact that corporations are switching to contract work (lower wages, no benefits), shows that they care about profit rather than delivering a decent enough game.

Layoffs are a consequence of capitalism, not the root cause. Think about it. If you can make more profit by hiring contractors instead of employees, you might as well. You can make a higher profit, even if the product is half-baked and unfinished. And if you’re kind, you can send a skeleton crew to clean up the mess by updating the game to a working state and eventually they will move onto something else. There’s been a recent trend of unfinished, half-baked products coming to market, such as Battlefield 2042, Halo Infinite, etc.

It’s an infinitely more solvable problem than capitalism: pass employment reforms.

The employment in this case is replacing full-time employees (usually with a wealth of knowledge especially in regards to game engines, art, etc.) with contract workers. It is more profitable in this regard. Employment reforms won’t fix this. The fundamental issue is the game being released is gaining profit at a rate where the game itself is virtually unprofitable. Cosmetics, Gameplay Advantages, Microtransactions, all of these contribute to the profit of the game in some way. Hence why employees are redundant, and thus they are laid off, or filed for redundancy.

The choice is to stop working counter to the mutually aligned long-term interests of literally everyone - the company, its staff, its customers.

The long-term interest of corporations is to gain as much profit as it can before the company sinks to the ground. The shareholders are problem. Capitalism is the problem. Do not blame the layoffs. Layoffs are a consequence of capitalism, it forces workers to become the reserve army of labour. Please, I recommend you read Marxist theory before claiming that capitalism isn’t the problem. With everything that exists in our society, Capitalism is always the problem.

Basically the bourgeoisie that own the major studios are so obsessed with profit that they make blatantly unsustainable decisions like overmonetization and shipping unfinished games every few years.

This is because most games now cater to an online-only, usually free to play (although it’s not always the case), multiplayer market where there is battlepasses, microtransactions, and whatnot. So that most people pay for cosmetics (or even gameplay advantages, thus making the game pay-to-win), so that the company can earn the most revenue. Being unfinished is only a side-effect due to time-crunching and inexperienced developers.

Now look what’s happening, the studios have no choice but to lay off employees to recoup the costs they inflicted upon themselves and the worst affected are the fired employees naturally.

They lay off employees because full-time employees are entitled to benefits such as sick leave, overtime pay, etc. What most studios are doing nowadays is shifting to contract work, where contractors get paid much less, and most of them are inexperienced because most game companies still use proprietary engines instead of an engine most people know i.e. Unreal Engine 5. This is the cause of unfinished products, but it doesn’t even matter because you paid for the product, and thus they get revenue. Cyberpunk 2077 was already profitable before it was launched. So the product, despite being botched and half-baked, was already profitable.

Indies are no better. They also suffer from the problem of shipping unfinished games but unlike their AAA counterparts, they suffer from genuine lack of time and resources to deliver games in a timely manner.

That is true. Indie developers are petit-bourgeois anyways. We only support them because there is genuine risk and they will fail if they do not deliver a quality product. This is why we tend to trust indie developers. Nonetheless, it is not like most of them don’t want their product to generate revenue. If they never wanted revenue, they could release for free or open-source it, like what mods typically are.

Games are shifting from where the product matters to the service. Everything you interact with the game requires spending, and spending people will do. Not most, but those who are suckered in definitely will. They generate enough profit where if the product is half-baked, it is fine to leave it as such, or leave a skeleton crew to update the game and make it in a serviceable product years later. You do not own the game anymore. You only own the lease to play the game for a (supposed) indefinite amount of time, until the developers decide to cut it completely from the library of Steam, Epic Games Launcher, etc. This is where gaming is going.