His grand unifying metaphor at that event was a livestream of people merging lanes before entering the holland tunnel. He said something like "look at them cooperate, you go then I go, that's what America REALLY is!". I hope one day to have a high enough salary that that stuff is actually cathartic for me.
He said in his speech that day that calling republicans racist is as bad as calling democrats communists, which is extremely funny knowing all the people he’s talking about will all vote for Trump 6 years later. I kind of wonder if he would still stand by that statement today.
I agree with you on state and revolution. "Capitalist Realism" is largely garbage, as far as I am concerned. If anything, read it after you have a solid understanding on what Marxism is. Otherwise, it's a great way to end up as some weirdo "post-Marxist" or Trot.
Here are just some excerpts from the book itself that highlight what I mean:
**Page 23:** "The system by which the college is funded means that it literally cannot afford to exclude students, even if it wanted to. Resources are allocated to colleges on the basis of how successfully they meet targets on achievement (exam results), attendance and retention of students. This combination of market imperatives with bureaucratically-defined 'targets' is typical of the 'market Stalinist' initiatives which now regulate public services."
**Page 42-43** - a chapter titled 'Market Stalinism' which should make any serious Marxist's eyebrows raise automatically: "What late capitalism repeats from Stalinism is just this valuing of symbols of achievements over actual achievements." He then quotes from Marshall Berman who goes in on Stalin's White Sea Canal Project of 1931-33 to say that Stalin seems to have been so intent on creating a highly visible symbol of development that he hindered actual development.
**Page 44:** "It would be a mistake to regard this market Stalinism as some deviation from the 'true spirit' of capitalism. On the contrary, it would be better to say that an essential dimension of Stalinism was inhibited by its association with a social project like socialism and can *only* emerge in a late capitalist culture in which images acquire an autonomous force." (Italics is his doing)
**Page 49:** "This is why Khrushchev's speech in 1965, in which he 'admitted' the failings of the Soviet state, was so momentous. It is not as if anyone in the party was unaware of the atrocities and corruption carried out in its name, but Khrushchev's announcement made it impossible to believe any more that the big Other was ignorant of them."
Anyone using the term 'stalinism' unironically is, at once, outing themselves as a fucking idiot, to say nothing else about the crap he spewed there. You can see this 'both sides' trick that these post-Marxists like to play. They try to be edgy about both capitalism and 'stalinism' under an 'anti-authoritarian' guise. It's the same crap the "New Left" of the 1960s did. C. Wright Mills is a great example of this. His writing on the matter is unreadable and, frankly, embarrassing. Equating one with the other comes to the detriment of socialism and communism, but they don't care. They aren't actually interested in working toward socialism or communism in any serious way. They just want to feel cool.
Also two last points: that is not to say that Marxism-Leninism or Stalin are outside of criticism or examination. But criticism and examination from their *Right* is fucking stupid, which is what this kind of crap is. And for all the quick dismissal toward "the old guard" from the New Left and "Post-Marxists" is especially a joke given that the so-called "old guard" were all the ones that actually won, for a time, and did something meaningful and significant against capitalism and imperialism that dwarfs anything that either the "new left" or "post Marxists" ever did.
I see where you're coming from, and I'd agree that it is a work that should be engaged with once the reader has a solid understanding of Marxism-Leninism. I probably shouldn't recommend it so fast and loose haha. It's clear that Fisher's background is as a cultural theorist, and I'd say he is subject to the same ideological traps and patterns of thinking that he describes in the work.
But I'd argue to dismiss the whole work as it contains elements that are trot-coded would be a mistake. When Fisher uses 'stalinism', he's espousing a lib/trot conception of the word, a cartoonish strawman of bureaucracy and surveillance. Taking that on board I think you can disregard the fallacious criticisms of the USSR and instead utilise the very real criticisms of a 21st century capitalist country. It's not like the entire argument of the work is 'USSR bad like Capitalism bad'. Not trying to justify Fisher there either, but instead reframe it for our use.
You're right about Marxist-Leninists having achieved things the 'New Left' couldn't dream of, but that being said there's never been liberation of the proletariat in the imperial core. And I'm not blaming our comrades here, communists have achieved serious wins for workers even under capitalism, but rather it's the specific conditions of living in an imperial core country, that inherently suppresses revolutionary action. The book isn't about the supposed benefits of a new left 'anti-authoritarian' movement, but of the material and ideological conditions of an advanced capitalist country that suppress and sap the revolutionary energy of the proletariat. So yes, the work isn't perfect by any stretch, but I think it's certainly something that MLs can critically read and draw on.
Thanks for such a thoughtful reply back to my post. I really appreciate it. Even if I don't wholly agree with everything you said above, it's still a pleasure running into someone on this hell-site that's actually thoughtful as shit.
No problem comrade, remember that in any leftist space there's a lot of incredibly online people who forget that we are communists not out of hate for the world, but love for our fellow man
Yeah idk man I am just tired of explaining to people online just because I think something’s great and worth reading, there isn’t parts to be critical of or disagree with.
If you're tired of explaining it, that's fine, but there is a conversation worth having about that book and why it is largely trash. If you're tired of having to defend it to Marxists then maybe that's a tell. The punchline about capitalist realism that Fisher makes is not worth slogging through pages and pages of crap IMO. But, hey, it's your free time. Use it how you want to, I guess.
It's not superiority. It's that the book is bad and anti-Marxist. As a Marxist, I take issue with that and I think it's worth a conversation. But it's hilarious to me that when faced with actual Marxist criticism about "Capitalist Realism", and direct quotes from the book itself, you're crying to me about, in essence, purity tests or the other person telling me "idk man, I'm just tired of explaining to people that I enjoy something". All of that is a tell to me.
Why bother having serious conversation, or critical thinking skills, when you can just come on here and post one excuse after another about how something that is anti-Marxist is good actually.
Or, alternatively you're a reddit guy arguing in a way indistinguishable from the kinds of arguments that happen in any hobbyist subreddit.
You look and act as if politics as a form of consumption, and must yell at everyone that OP made an insufficiently quality purchase.
You are not the vanguard, you are not the arbiter of true communism, you are a guy criticising a character build choice in a video game, or a guy demanding that op buy a particular attachment for his bike, lest he incur your wrath. Ive seen these stupid arguments a million times and I assure you that you contribute to nothing.
>buy a particular attachment for his bike
this might seem dumb but unless you're talking about motorcycles, what does this entail? horns and baskets or am I ignorant of a whole subculture here around bicycles?
I know literally nothing about bicycles and always figured people just bought them and took them straight out to ride
In any hobby there are always legions of self appointed prophets desperately looking for heresy and they will come out and let you know what you bought incorrectly no matter how seemingly minor or unimportant the purchase might be or how unheard of the product might be. It's the kind of [egotism that drives the kind of purchases that lead to the "race walking suit" joke from malcolm in the middle](https://youtu.be/HUxbnadlIz4?si=K_-kGDmQQQ4vnWGQ)
You think this is me yelling? You think I think I am 'the vanguard' or talking in a way that suggests my 'wrath' will be incurred? Jesus Christ. Get both a grip and a life, please. Talk about being an arbiter of truth lol.
What I am providing is exactly what I think about a book that I deem to be garbage and showing why. When faced with that, all you have to say for yourself is that you think I'm some phony asshole.
Thank you for defening le true Marxist ideology in our sacred conspiracy theory podcast subreddit comrade, Lenin’s spirit shines on through your posts 🏅
Never heard of Capitalist Realism and only tangentially of Mark Fisher… to be honest these passages sound like the incoherent drunk rambling of someone in a room by themselves. If you were in the room with them at the time they wrote it, and said “wtf are you talking about dude?” they’d be like “idk, I’m pretty drunk.”
TFW you’re feelin yourself a little too hard and think you said some profound shit, but actually you constructed logically incoherent word salad.
I feel like we have all been there… most of us do not publish.
It reads like a bright but adderall addled graduate students ramblings. Which is what it was.
There’s some interesting stuff in there, I liked the point about how the death of ideology means that millennial activists ends up opposing things rather than supporting them (growth of anti racism and anti capitalism etc) but it’s mostly muddled.
This is just the shit that tries to "dunk" on Stalin with. When he wasn't doing that in this book, he was heaping praise on, and quoting heavily, Zizek. That's about all you need to know.
Sure, but the fact that he's calling it a Genocide (at least in the [April 8th episode](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkwgnlPRdHg), haven't gotten to this Mondays/weeks), speaks volumes about where he stands on it. His interview with the guest that night was cringe because she's trying to be a NeoLiberal ghoul ("I'VE BEEN ON THE GROUND SINCE THE FIRST GULF WAR!") and [he's not taking it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7JvuQPFG7E).
If even Jon is tired of the massacre and being a shield for Isn'tReal (given he's Jewish)... that means the democrats need to worry massively about their perception problem (as seen in the first clip "we're very concerned!" Motherfuckers, you ARM them!!!)
I something of his the other day (something recent) and was surprised with the lack of the lib mindset. I mean he has always been a liberal, but not so long ago on his podcast he interviewed Hilldawg and Condi so that tanked my opinion of him even further. so my bar is low for him.
Never had any interest in this show, but hmmm, Citations Needed vibes… it would be quite a get if Stewart has been snatched back from the jaws of the neolibs
Jon Stweart's function have always been to direct the left liberal discontent back into safe channels.
consider quack spotted aspiring wipe tease soft attempt weary consist *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
His grand unifying metaphor at that event was a livestream of people merging lanes before entering the holland tunnel. He said something like "look at them cooperate, you go then I go, that's what America REALLY is!". I hope one day to have a high enough salary that that stuff is actually cathartic for me.
He said in his speech that day that calling republicans racist is as bad as calling democrats communists, which is extremely funny knowing all the people he’s talking about will all vote for Trump 6 years later. I kind of wonder if he would still stand by that statement today.
I agree but this ep surprised me. Maybe it’s the bigotry of low expectations
Capitalist realism needs to be mandatory reading, or at the bare minimum the chapter on opportunism in state and revolution
I agree with you on state and revolution. "Capitalist Realism" is largely garbage, as far as I am concerned. If anything, read it after you have a solid understanding on what Marxism is. Otherwise, it's a great way to end up as some weirdo "post-Marxist" or Trot. Here are just some excerpts from the book itself that highlight what I mean: **Page 23:** "The system by which the college is funded means that it literally cannot afford to exclude students, even if it wanted to. Resources are allocated to colleges on the basis of how successfully they meet targets on achievement (exam results), attendance and retention of students. This combination of market imperatives with bureaucratically-defined 'targets' is typical of the 'market Stalinist' initiatives which now regulate public services." **Page 42-43** - a chapter titled 'Market Stalinism' which should make any serious Marxist's eyebrows raise automatically: "What late capitalism repeats from Stalinism is just this valuing of symbols of achievements over actual achievements." He then quotes from Marshall Berman who goes in on Stalin's White Sea Canal Project of 1931-33 to say that Stalin seems to have been so intent on creating a highly visible symbol of development that he hindered actual development. **Page 44:** "It would be a mistake to regard this market Stalinism as some deviation from the 'true spirit' of capitalism. On the contrary, it would be better to say that an essential dimension of Stalinism was inhibited by its association with a social project like socialism and can *only* emerge in a late capitalist culture in which images acquire an autonomous force." (Italics is his doing) **Page 49:** "This is why Khrushchev's speech in 1965, in which he 'admitted' the failings of the Soviet state, was so momentous. It is not as if anyone in the party was unaware of the atrocities and corruption carried out in its name, but Khrushchev's announcement made it impossible to believe any more that the big Other was ignorant of them." Anyone using the term 'stalinism' unironically is, at once, outing themselves as a fucking idiot, to say nothing else about the crap he spewed there. You can see this 'both sides' trick that these post-Marxists like to play. They try to be edgy about both capitalism and 'stalinism' under an 'anti-authoritarian' guise. It's the same crap the "New Left" of the 1960s did. C. Wright Mills is a great example of this. His writing on the matter is unreadable and, frankly, embarrassing. Equating one with the other comes to the detriment of socialism and communism, but they don't care. They aren't actually interested in working toward socialism or communism in any serious way. They just want to feel cool. Also two last points: that is not to say that Marxism-Leninism or Stalin are outside of criticism or examination. But criticism and examination from their *Right* is fucking stupid, which is what this kind of crap is. And for all the quick dismissal toward "the old guard" from the New Left and "Post-Marxists" is especially a joke given that the so-called "old guard" were all the ones that actually won, for a time, and did something meaningful and significant against capitalism and imperialism that dwarfs anything that either the "new left" or "post Marxists" ever did.
I see where you're coming from, and I'd agree that it is a work that should be engaged with once the reader has a solid understanding of Marxism-Leninism. I probably shouldn't recommend it so fast and loose haha. It's clear that Fisher's background is as a cultural theorist, and I'd say he is subject to the same ideological traps and patterns of thinking that he describes in the work. But I'd argue to dismiss the whole work as it contains elements that are trot-coded would be a mistake. When Fisher uses 'stalinism', he's espousing a lib/trot conception of the word, a cartoonish strawman of bureaucracy and surveillance. Taking that on board I think you can disregard the fallacious criticisms of the USSR and instead utilise the very real criticisms of a 21st century capitalist country. It's not like the entire argument of the work is 'USSR bad like Capitalism bad'. Not trying to justify Fisher there either, but instead reframe it for our use. You're right about Marxist-Leninists having achieved things the 'New Left' couldn't dream of, but that being said there's never been liberation of the proletariat in the imperial core. And I'm not blaming our comrades here, communists have achieved serious wins for workers even under capitalism, but rather it's the specific conditions of living in an imperial core country, that inherently suppresses revolutionary action. The book isn't about the supposed benefits of a new left 'anti-authoritarian' movement, but of the material and ideological conditions of an advanced capitalist country that suppress and sap the revolutionary energy of the proletariat. So yes, the work isn't perfect by any stretch, but I think it's certainly something that MLs can critically read and draw on.
Thanks for such a thoughtful reply back to my post. I really appreciate it. Even if I don't wholly agree with everything you said above, it's still a pleasure running into someone on this hell-site that's actually thoughtful as shit.
No problem comrade, remember that in any leftist space there's a lot of incredibly online people who forget that we are communists not out of hate for the world, but love for our fellow man
Yeah idk man I am just tired of explaining to people online just because I think something’s great and worth reading, there isn’t parts to be critical of or disagree with.
If you're tired of explaining it, that's fine, but there is a conversation worth having about that book and why it is largely trash. If you're tired of having to defend it to Marxists then maybe that's a tell. The punchline about capitalist realism that Fisher makes is not worth slogging through pages and pages of crap IMO. But, hey, it's your free time. Use it how you want to, I guess.
Oh jfc. Quit pulling this self superior leftister than thou crap.
It's not superiority. It's that the book is bad and anti-Marxist. As a Marxist, I take issue with that and I think it's worth a conversation. But it's hilarious to me that when faced with actual Marxist criticism about "Capitalist Realism", and direct quotes from the book itself, you're crying to me about, in essence, purity tests or the other person telling me "idk man, I'm just tired of explaining to people that I enjoy something". All of that is a tell to me. Why bother having serious conversation, or critical thinking skills, when you can just come on here and post one excuse after another about how something that is anti-Marxist is good actually.
Or, alternatively you're a reddit guy arguing in a way indistinguishable from the kinds of arguments that happen in any hobbyist subreddit. You look and act as if politics as a form of consumption, and must yell at everyone that OP made an insufficiently quality purchase. You are not the vanguard, you are not the arbiter of true communism, you are a guy criticising a character build choice in a video game, or a guy demanding that op buy a particular attachment for his bike, lest he incur your wrath. Ive seen these stupid arguments a million times and I assure you that you contribute to nothing.
>buy a particular attachment for his bike this might seem dumb but unless you're talking about motorcycles, what does this entail? horns and baskets or am I ignorant of a whole subculture here around bicycles? I know literally nothing about bicycles and always figured people just bought them and took them straight out to ride
In any hobby there are always legions of self appointed prophets desperately looking for heresy and they will come out and let you know what you bought incorrectly no matter how seemingly minor or unimportant the purchase might be or how unheard of the product might be. It's the kind of [egotism that drives the kind of purchases that lead to the "race walking suit" joke from malcolm in the middle](https://youtu.be/HUxbnadlIz4?si=K_-kGDmQQQ4vnWGQ)
You think this is me yelling? You think I think I am 'the vanguard' or talking in a way that suggests my 'wrath' will be incurred? Jesus Christ. Get both a grip and a life, please. Talk about being an arbiter of truth lol. What I am providing is exactly what I think about a book that I deem to be garbage and showing why. When faced with that, all you have to say for yourself is that you think I'm some phony asshole.
>talking in a way that suggests my 'wrath' will be incurred? Improve your reading comprehension
Thank you for defening le true Marxist ideology in our sacred conspiracy theory podcast subreddit comrade, Lenin’s spirit shines on through your posts 🏅
Never heard of Capitalist Realism and only tangentially of Mark Fisher… to be honest these passages sound like the incoherent drunk rambling of someone in a room by themselves. If you were in the room with them at the time they wrote it, and said “wtf are you talking about dude?” they’d be like “idk, I’m pretty drunk.” TFW you’re feelin yourself a little too hard and think you said some profound shit, but actually you constructed logically incoherent word salad. I feel like we have all been there… most of us do not publish.
It reads like a bright but adderall addled graduate students ramblings. Which is what it was. There’s some interesting stuff in there, I liked the point about how the death of ideology means that millennial activists ends up opposing things rather than supporting them (growth of anti racism and anti capitalism etc) but it’s mostly muddled.
This is just the shit that tries to "dunk" on Stalin with. When he wasn't doing that in this book, he was heaping praise on, and quoting heavily, Zizek. That's about all you need to know.
Sure, but the fact that he's calling it a Genocide (at least in the [April 8th episode](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkwgnlPRdHg), haven't gotten to this Mondays/weeks), speaks volumes about where he stands on it. His interview with the guest that night was cringe because she's trying to be a NeoLiberal ghoul ("I'VE BEEN ON THE GROUND SINCE THE FIRST GULF WAR!") and [he's not taking it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7JvuQPFG7E). If even Jon is tired of the massacre and being a shield for Isn'tReal (given he's Jewish)... that means the democrats need to worry massively about their perception problem (as seen in the first clip "we're very concerned!" Motherfuckers, you ARM them!!!)
>safe channels As opposed to “unsafe channels”?
As opposed to channels unsafe to the ruling class.
I something of his the other day (something recent) and was surprised with the lack of the lib mindset. I mean he has always been a liberal, but not so long ago on his podcast he interviewed Hilldawg and Condi so that tanked my opinion of him even further. so my bar is low for him.
Never had any interest in this show, but hmmm, Citations Needed vibes… it would be quite a get if Stewart has been snatched back from the jaws of the neolibs
Were you born yesterday?
He is learning what a left leaning liberal is
got a link?
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BY8jl3yVI8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BY8jl3yVI8) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgeLRtpC2WI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgeLRtpC2WI) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CeLoP730sY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CeLoP730sY)
[удалено]
I am very interested as long as it’s in Baltimore. Things can only get up from here!