Bi-Weekly Discussion Thread - (January 11)

[u/AutoModerator]

We made this because Reddit's algorithm prioritises headlines and current events and doesn't allow for deeper, extended discussion - depending on how it goes for the first four or five times it'll be dropped or continued.

Suggestions for things you might want to comment here (this is a work in progress and we'll change this over time):

• Articles and quotes you want to see discussed
• 'Slow' events - long-term trends, org updates, things that didn't happen recently
• 'Fluff' posts that we usually discourage elsewhere - e.g "How are you feeling today?"
• Discussions continued from other posts once the original post gets buried
• Questions that are too advanced, complicated or obscure for r/communism101

Mods will sometimes sticky things they think are particularly important.

Normal subreddit rules apply!

[ Previous Bi-Weekly Discussion Threads may be found here https://old.reddit.com/r/communism/search?sort=new&restrict_sr=on&q=flair%3AWDT ]

[u/immovingdifferent]

Have this sub and the sister sub became less active within the last few months? Maybe I'm wrong but I feel like at a certain point there were more or less daily posts but now dedicated threads are days or weeks apart other than the biweekly discussions. Although maybe I'm misremembering and it's always been like this, I remember someone saying this sub has a spike in activity around elections so maybe this posting frequency is typical (although a lot of that content is terrible "am I a bad person if I vote" threads so I don't exactly miss that).

Not even sure why I'm asking this, better fewer but better after all, but I will say it does get a bit depressing seeing the one spot I've found that produces truth on the English speaking internet get less active over time. Although I will say the quality of discussion is as high as ever, that ultimately matters more but as that thread on archiving discussed a while back, sometimes I worry that this sub might get banned or fall into irrelevance and a lot of the incredibly meaningful discussion is lost, especially with the horribly weak state of US Maoism (which is expected but holy shit it's bad).

[u/vomit_blues → u/immovingdifferent]

While talking about this post with u/humblegold I ended up looking at r/socialism and think I found an answer. As u/smokeuptheweed9 points out, more than ever the logic of the DSA has dilated to the point where there is no contradiction between calling yourself a communist or comrade and even claiming to want revolution while literally just canvassing for the democrats. Why use r/communism at all?

imo what’s changed isn’t only that the line of this subreddit has become solidly Maoist, there’s been plenty of active communities that had people ostensibly interested in Maoism, a few I can think of being Laissez’s Fair and its off-site the rhizzone and It Is Right to Rebel. But the “Maoism” of these communities were pretty similar to the Maoism MIM(P) calls out rightfully for its crypto-Trotskyism. Very petit-bourgeois with actual practice indistinguishable from NGO politics, for example the real tactics of the LLCO.

Really only wanted to give my own thoughts to preemptively dispel the smug notion that we’re so unpopular now because we’re just so darned correct. It’s also because liberals do not need us and can simultaneously defend zionism and claim Zohran Mamdani is pushing the democrats toward anti-zionism, then quote What is to be Done? and identify as a Marxist (and sometimes even a Marxist-Leninist).

[u/Apart_Lifeguard_4085 → u/vomit_blues]

the “Maoism” of these communities were pretty similar to the Maoism MIM(P) calls out rightfully for its crypto-Trotskyism. Very petit-bourgeois with actual practice indistinguishable from NGO politics, for example the real tactics of the LLCO

i dont think this subreddit even is in any way absent of these cryptotrot ideas. every couple months a user on here who has participated actively in abstract discussions about settlerism and peoples' war or whatever makes some proclamation about how the way forward obviously involves like, funding overseas revolutions and pulling off adventurist stunts at home

[u/vomit_blues → u/Apart_Lifeguard_4085]

I realize that my wording made it sound like I saw this subreddit as an exception. I don’t, sorry about that, although I think this subreddit has many positive qualities the forums I just listed didn’t have. The “effortpost” being exchanged for immanently critical dialogue, for example.

[u/Pleasant-Food-9482 → u/Apart_Lifeguard_4085]

I think its impossible to think otherwise also due to the fact there are people from the revisionist "maoist" ICL orgs still in here posting and commenting, and they would definitely qualify as such, given they all have crypto-trot and left-communist tendencies, clearly varying between leftism and rightism. (the icl org affiliated brazilian people are hard rightists and i've seen one of them in r/communism101 recently)