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comment by kleinbl00
kleinbl00  ·  2521 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The Spurious Scandal of ‘Communism for Kids’

So have you read it?

"The future doesn't have to look like that" is basically Graeber's schtick, and he's hella more readable than this. And while he plays a little fast'n'loose with anthropology, he doesn't straight up make shit up like claiming merchants didn't exist before the 16th century and then call it metaphor.

And I read the translator's/article author's blurb, but I don't agree with it. This is far more your wheelhouse than mine but the phrase I'm used to seeing is "Marxism-Leninism" because the true hawks will point out that there has yet to be a true Communist state because they're impossible by inspection.

It seems to me that a thoughtful, well-reasoned argument (for kids) about the different structures of economy would be criticized by the right, but not howling-monkey criticized. The argument against this book is not just that it's wrong, it's that it's trite and wrong (and filled with heinously ugly illustrations).





user-inactivated  ·  2521 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I have read the book. It was trying to do what the translator says it was trying to do. It fails.

Part of the definition of communism is the absence of a state. Marxism-Leninism was about the party taking over the state, creating a socialist society, and then doing away with the state, at which point you'd have communism. So there were states run by communists, but there has never been communism. That said, there's a reason you see more anarchists than tankies now, and why they're strident about prefigurative politics.

kleinbl00  ·  2521 days ago  ·  link  ·  

every time we have these conversations I have to do a Wikipedia deep dive. Now I'm reading about SDS.

user-inactivated  ·  2521 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    Now I'm reading about SDS.

Coincidentally, I just finished Sing a Battle Song.