What Is Marxism?

An explanation of classical Marxism, followed by an explanation of the general term 'Marxism.'
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0:00 Intro
0:38 Private Property
10:18 Historical Materialism
19:49 Communism
25:51 Totalitarianism
29:00 Adaptations of Marxism
30:00 What Is Marxism?
Sources:
Two Treatises Of Government: John Locke
Economic And Philosophical Manuscripts Of 1844: Karl Marx
Capital: Karl Marx
The Communist Manifesto: Karl Marx & Frederick Engels
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific - Frederick Engels
The Principles Of Communism: Frederick Engels
The German Ideology: Karl Marx
Karl Marx's Funeral - Frederick Engels
The Poverty Of Philosophy: Karl Marx
Anti-Duhring: Frederick Engels
Critique Of The Gotha Program - Karl Marx
Karl Marx: Isaiah Berlin
Karl Marx: A Nineteenth Century Life: Jonathan Spencer
A History Of Western Philosophy: Bertrand Russell
Letter From Engels To August Bebel 1884 - Frederick Engels
The Open Society And Its Enemies: Karl Popper

[@realryanchapman]

I thought I'd return with some follow-up thoughts. One thing that needs to be said is that Marx & Engels wrote a lot. Their writing was consistent, but not perfectly consistent. Stances on violence, war, and the preconditions for revolution fluctuated. Marx also wasn't the clearest writer, favoring emotional language over technical precision. On top of that, there were holes in their theory, or at least spotty parts, sometimes on important points (ex. what exactly does the 'dictatorship of the proletariat' mean? How can the dictatorship of the proletariat rule 'democratically?' What did Engels mean when he said the State would 'wither away?'). As a result, there is no universally agreed upon understanding of what classical Marxism actually is. Circles tend to form around different interpretations of it, each circle believing they hold the correct understanding of Marxism. That has led to a long history of disagreement on Marx and fighting among Marxists. Within that, I tried to stick with the closest we have to a standard understanding, using both primary and secondary sources. I tried to put as little of my own opinion into it as possible and to flag where I did, like my interpretation of 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his means'. I think the part that rubbed the most people the wrong way was the claim that Marx's communism is essentially totalitarian. In my experience that's the standard explanation, and I did flag that some disagree with it. But I think it squares quite fully with his writing. There's no one sentence you can point to where he says 'this is a totalitarian society' (the word didn't exist yet), so you have to analyze what he said to get there. The communist society he described was one where communism was forced on the whole population. Just reading the Manifesto makes that clear, and the passages I cite in this video flesh that out more. They describe a society entirely permeated by communism, with no opposition, with communist politics heavily encroaching into the lives of all. Communists and Marx called that a 'free' society. That conception of a free society seems to have come from Rousseau's idea that society should be ruled by the 'general will,' which he laid out in his Social Contract. Once the general will of the people is determined (Rousseau did not say how that process should work, something he shares with Marx), then that general will needs to be forced upon the rest of the public. The general will is a monolithic guiding power that rules all, and that allows nothing to conflict with it. Everyone is 'forced to be free' as Rousseau put it. It's a peculiar conception of freedom. Rousseau acknowledged that, and quickly gave up trying to articulate what actually makes it a form of freedom. But that's the 'free' 'democratic' society Marx was describing that the dictatorship of the proletariat would create. Marx named the ruling idea that would guide the general will: communism. I'm describing totalitarianism. A society where communism shapes everything political. Communism is forced upon everyone to the extent deemed necessary by those in power (again, communists), in order to create a society free of class conflict/oppression. You could think about it this way: in a liberal/capitalist society, if you want to live your life as a communist, you're relatively free to do it. If you want to form a business with communist/socialist principles, go for it. If you want to form a commune, have at it. If you want to participate in politics as a communist, feel free to try it. You can really do pretty much whatever you want with your life, and participate in politics however you want (as long as you don't threaten violence). If you don't want to be political, that's fine too. Liberal societies do not have a vision, an end goal, that they try to push everyone toward. There's no utopia at the end of the tunnel. It's more or less a sandbox design for a society, and the people within them get to decide how they want to live their lives. In a communist society, everyone needs to be communist. That includes Marx's communism, which again forces itself onto the public with the goal of entirely shaping politics in order to eliminate class conflict. People are not cattle, so repression would be needed in order to accomplish that. It's possible that if a communist society existed for a long time, and communism was widely accepted by the public, communists would feel secure enough in their position to give political freedom and control over affairs back to the whole people, but as Bertrand Russell put it: 'this is a distant ideal, like the Second Coming; in the meantime, there is war and dictatorship, and insistence upon ideological orthodoxy.' (History of West. Phil. 790) If I'm wrong about what I just said, I've never seen anyone successfully articulate why - in the comments or anywhere in anything I've read. I think it's the closest we have to a standard explanation for good reason. Marx did endorse democratic practices by the Paris Commune, but that was when democracy brought about a result that he liked (voting was restricted to Paris and held at an especially radical time). I'm not aware of any examples of him endorsing democracy that brought about a result that went against his views. If you only endorse democracy that moves society towards socialism, and you condemn all other examples as 'bourgeois democracy,' it's hard to conclude you're in favor of democracy. I've never seen anyone deal with these things and still claim that he was democratic and not totalitarian. Also when socialists in Marx's time said they should spend their time pushing for gradual reforms, like expanding voting rights to the working class, Marx condemned it. He didn't want workers to have more of a say in a pluralistic, democratic society. He wanted class tensions to build until they exploded, ending with communists taking control of everything. I covered that in my in-depth socialism vid. Last point: I offended some by skipping Marx's economics. Some even say his claims entirely depend on his economics. I think that's an oversimplification. Some of his beliefs aren't verifiable or falsifiable by economics, like the claim that capitalism is the last form of society featuring class conflict, and that the next society will be communist. Also his core beliefs existed before his economics developed. He believed that capitalism was exploitative/alienating, that communism will be the next, preferable society, and he believed in historical materialism early in life (his 20s). He then spent the rest of his life developing his economic theory predicting the end of capitalism that we see in Capital. So his own beliefs did not depend on his economics in order to form. His economic theory came second, appearing to affirm beliefs he already had. That said, if you're interested in his economics, you can find explanations all over the internet. He's less politicized there. I may as well quickly lay out his theory and explain what I mean about it having mistakes. First, he thought that the amount of labor put into a product determines its value. Now imagine someone works for 10 hours. The worker creates product worth 10 hours of labor. But the worker isn't paid that amount. Let's say the worker created $100 worth of products in that 10 hours, but is only paid $50 in wages. The other $50 then is 'surplus value' i.e. profit for whoever owns the business. Crucially, the worker is only paid subsistence wages (from Ricardo's 'iron law of wages'), so the worker struggles and has no path to better their position in society through work. Others will take their job, so the worker can't bargain for more. The business owner then uses the $50 profit 'appropriated' (basically stolen) from the worker to expand their business. If that keeps up, the power dynamics in society will become more exaggerated. Workers stay poor, business owners get richer. They compete with each other, buying more machines, which means they need less human labor. Since labor (according to Marx) creates profit, profit rates fall. Businesses push down wages and lengthen hours to stay competitive. People can't buy what's being produced. A series of increasingly severe economic crises occur. Misery increases, a vast underclass forms, revolts, takes power. The two biggest places it goes wrong, afaik, are 1) Labor doesn't determine the value of a product. More goes into it, like supply, demand, marginal utility, factors relating to competition (or lack of) between firms. 2) He underestimates (really vilifies) the role of leaders (like CEOs) and managers. He doesn't appreciate how much work it takes to start and maintain a successful business, and in his theory the workers get credited with doing almost all the valuable work. There were also political assumptions in Marx's thinking, like the belief that 'capitalists' have a monopoly on political power (impeding reforms) which seems to be wrong. It also didn't make much sense at the time (& makes even less sense now) to define class by your relationship to the means of production, something Schumpeter pointed out ~80 years ago. Marx's theory was built on classical models and was to some extent out-of-date even in his lifetime, which is partially why it was slow to get attention (his writing style didn't help). In Marx's defense, he made many think about capitalism in a new way. Most academics that I've seen point out mistakes simultaneously acknowledge it as a work of genius. And some of his mistakes were also made by the best economists until then, like labor determining value. If you wonder why I didn't say this in the video, it's because to do it right I'd have to introduce Marx's terms (like labor theory of value) and thought it would be burdensome on the video, especially since I wasn't sure if the audience really cared about this stuff. - Ryan @realryanchapman

[@kerrysyn2384]

“It is natural for a liberal to speak of ‘democracy’ in general; but a Marxist will never forget to ask: ‘for what class?’” You may have already seen it but CCK Philosophy has a video that deals with your misconceptions. Watch it if you haven't. Marx and Marxist theorists would consider what you're calling "democracy" a bourgeois farce. Take the United States as example. Every four years the US gets to choose between two factions of the ruling class. The capitalist class has more power and influence than anyone else, wielding the state and media machinery for their purposes in a way the non-capitalist masses do not and cannot. Look at the way the British mass media has reacted to the rail strikes, the way working class activism is treated with utmost scorn. I can't tell if you realize the way you operate entirely within bourgeois, liberal ideology; fish don't know they're in water. To invoke Sovietological notions of "totalitarianism" in a discussion of Marx is embarrassing. You seem to have a problem with socialist forces having a hegemonic role in a hypothetical dictatorship of the proletariat. Do you have the same issue with capitalists having a hegemonic role (Citizens United, etc.) in capitalist socities? You should do more reading into Marx and Marxist theory. Read Marxist historians like Hobsbawm. You got A LOT wrong here and in the video. It could've been much worse so I have to commend you for that.

[@lousys1613]

A dictatorship of the proletariat is simply decisions being dictated by the proletariat regardless of the word dictatorships totalitarian indications. also communisms end goal is no state, its a stateless classless moneyless society so the state withering away in this context means achieving communism over time, through socalism. Also Marx did advocate for democracy by advocating for communism. His idea of Marxism (as previously stated class less stateless etc) was democracy not by some formal governmental voting body but by collective decision making in said stateless society. As for you talking about other ideologies existing in a Marxist society, so what if its totalitarian no one and I mean no one should respect the opinions of those whos policies advocate for anything that harms people. Facist and Capitalists' should not be able to re make the society that oppressed far more people than forcing a better society on people. Even if it's totalitarian the choice to be oppressed is not one anyone should make for a poor soul might make it. This bit is personal but I was dumbfounded by how you barely touched on his economics as he was an economist first and foremost as communism is an economic ideology. That's why (and I understand that political compass's are an ineffective way of mapping politics but I'm using it for analogy) political compass's go communism capitalisms and libertarianism and authoritarianism. Because communism is an economic ideology that's why communes are communist and libertarian but you can also have an authoritarian state with a communist organization of the economy. Now Marxism does entail both economic and political aspects but I feel you ignored a very significant part of Marxism.

[@yuxiangcheng597]

@@lousys1613 Yes, and I have to add, the terminologies in this video are packed with liberal ideologies, including the binary of democracy and totalitarianism. Ryan clearly have no knowledge on Marx's critique of capital (I'm not even talking about Marxist economics) and the Hegelian dialectics, which are crucial to have a basic understanding of Marx. Things Ryan mentioned in the third paragraph, like a system in which "politics can (not) encroach too far into people's lives", do not have a metaphysical connection to any society that names itself a "democracy", in fact, we can always see the opposite in real life.

[@NuanceOverDogma]

Marx was a huge hypocrite. We should be forward thinkers instead of putting trust in people who lived lies

[@NuanceOverDogma]

Marx exploited Engels & his family's money

[@AbuDurum]

You made a mistake. Marx did not say that the working class will become poorer if capital grows (in terms of their material position). He said that it will actually grow but at the cost of their social position. Meaning that the minority at the top will control greater wealth and thus global inequality will increase. You can read it in Wage-Labour and Capital.

[@Death2Capital]

He made several mistakes

[@jaimekaiser1622]

You must be a Karl Marx primary source

[@telomettotittettori8218]

Uhh yes yes so Marxism finally works all clear now I can finally become a communist zealot

[@AbuDurum]

@@telomettotittettori8218, that's not what I said. Grow up.

[@telomettotittettori8218]

@@AbuDurum learn basic economics.

[@VivekHaldar]

I love what you're doing by going back to primary sources, rather than repeat copies of copies of interpretations. We need more of this!

[@jpoeng]

Yes, he’s doing a good job, IMO, of covering a lot of ground in a short time while drawing on the original source material to make the key points.

[@normalizedinsanity4873]

@@jpoeng And leaving out what doesn't suit

[@JonahNelson7]

​@@normalizedinsanity4873 is that a dig or a compliment

[@seanleith5312]

Marxism is evil, period.

[@normalizedinsanity4873]

@@seanleith5312 Thanks for stating the obvious....that you have never read a word of Marx yourself and rely on interpretations that meet you preconceived need

[@alessandromarchiori38]

Probably the first American channel who explain Marxism without starting with “he caused millions of deaths, communists are like evil etc” or starting to enforce it with low quality communist propaganda. Thanks from Italy, great content

[@emilianosintarias7337]

Honestly it was sort of worse than that

[@emilianosintarias7337]

@Danger Disgusto but what about the inherent oppressed vs. oppressor story inherent in marxism? and in the bible? and in disney movies, and greek poetry, and classic rock music, and japanese anime, and star wars, the american revolution? the smurfs... Look, my concern with marxism is that is may be star warsism smuggled in through post modernism. Tell me one place star wars-ism has worked

[@cyberneticbutterfly8506]

@@emilianosintarias7337 Anywhere outside Disney.

[@FrozenRat161]

@@emilianosintarias7337 marxism is very modernist

[@emilianosintarias7337]

@@FrozenRat161 yes, true... and why are you telling me that? Just a friendly reminder or something?

[@happylifequotes5185]

Thank you Ryan. As always your ultra clear spot on explanation for this topic is a must listen. As it’s been for each topic that you’ve taken on.

[@stonesofvenice]

I absolutely love this channel. The detailed footnotes, the painstaking references, yet the brevity and lucidity. It gives me hope in humanity!

[@t00bgazer]

If you read marx youd lose so much faith in humanity and this content creator. Either he is painfully stupid or he is profoundly dishonest with his assesent of marxism.

[@eorobinson3]

Hell yea Ryan! Been waiting for a new one to drop!

[@elifarnsworth8762]

Many people don't realize how amazing these videos are. I have read a few of these primary sources, but really condensing it all down, and decoding it into laymens terms. So much work here.

[@bb-wb8sb]

lol

[@ryebread3417]

I would hope that if you have genuinely read these works that you would be able to recognize that this creator's understanding is incorrect

[@elifarnsworth8762]

@@ryebread3417 Id be interested to hear your arguments on why his understandings are incorrect? I can't say that I have dived extremely deeply into any of these philosophies, but it seems to me that you can choose myriad of definitions for marxism depending on who you read.

[@haiscore2614]

@@elifarnsworth8762 They don't plan on giving you an answer. They are replying to everyone who has a positive take on the video with "DYOR" so as to imply the guy is wildly off base and that if only you had read Marx yourself or watched socialist pundits like they do then you would understand that the century's old understanding of economics still somehow applies today and that we should be pushing towards a revolution.

[@elifarnsworth8762]

@@haiscore2614 I have read Marx, and I have also read Thomas Sowells, as well as Ludwig Von Mises analysis of Marx. I feel like I have the ideas down quite well, as well as the complete lack of understanding Marx had. However, it is interesting to hear people who have delved so deep into the intricacy. I think it gets a little superfluous when they start discussion of minor variations as if they are altering the meanings of words altogether (when many authors - including Marx himself- )change the meanings so frequently. The main complaint I have with this KZbin is he has a VERY defined set of definitions - but using Marx own words I could debunk his declared definition.

[@gregorykavivya1105]

Great work, I love that you actually present quotations from original texts

[@AANasseh]

When Ryan drops a video, I stop everything for the following half hour. His breakdowns can’t wait!

[@coryb8796]

Same

[@adamnoble1689]

So fucking good. Each sentence is trustable. A deductive construction that I can trust. I love this man.

[@fffgeraldy]

My first Ryan video here, And I have to say from this point forward I will concur 🤟🏽

[@Machobravo]

You’re doing a great job. Don’t discount your skills and intuitions.

[@milostone6498]

✊

[@Gigachild]

When I want to learn a topic, I start by taking notes on one of your videos. Very well done content!

[@skaz1504]

I love your work so far, Ryan. Please keep it up.

[@ernestoantonio1416]

You forgot to talk about the "withering away of the state" in Marxism. "The society which organizes production anew on the basis of free and equal association of the producers will put the whole state machinery where it will then belong - into the museum of antiquities, next to the spinning wheel and the bronze ax." - Friedrich Engels, in "The Origins of The Family, Private Property, and The State."

[@fenzelian]

And of course Engels had not yet heard the Danish proverb - “Det er vanskeligt at spaa, især naar det gælder Fremtiden.”

[@Lars6138]

@@fenzelian And yet Engels correctly predicted the causes, the trigger, the time and the various outcomes of WW1, even suggesting the possibility of a communist revolution in Russia.

[@pureblood3823]

​@@Lars6138 shhhh commie

[@marw9541]

@@Lars6138 Predicting WW1 wasn't exactly hard to do, Bismarck did it a decade earlier than Engels. In addition Engels's number for the number of soldiers was an underestimate of at the very least 800%, and you had a single communist uprising that was in the least developed power in Europe, which also wasn't even clearly going to work except for the stupid decisions of the Provisional Government and more specifically Kerensky

[@Lars6138]

@@marw9541 the details of his prediction is remarkable. He missed on the numbers estimate, but that doesn't make it much less impressive.

[@somenerdguy]

by far the best bottom-up explanation of marxism i have ever listened to. came across your channel a few weeks ago and have been learning a lot

[@ryebread3417]

Pleas reference other sources, or better yet, read the work yourself! This creator does not have an accurate understanding of the discussed topics

[@somenerdguy]

@@ryebread3417 i have been doing a bit of reading and watching all over the place regarding political philosophy and can't really understand what ryan got wrong in this video. care to elaborate?

[@ryebread3417]

@@somenerdguy There were a few things here and there in the beginning, but it was mainly towards the end where things fell apart. This is a really long response lol, sorry. It is pretty informative tho imo. For one thing, this idea that Marxism includes some vision of a communist society is largely untrue. Marxism centers around historical materialism, through which we can make some general speculation as to how the force of history will continue, but Marx did not see communism as some set society that we must work towards. To quote Marx: "Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence". By this, he means that there is no set communist "state of affairs" that we must shape society to fit. Instead, we are merely following the flow of history, and this flow will eventually lead us out of capitalism. Instead of actually investigating or critiquing historical materialism, Ryan dismissed Marx as a "fortune teller". He made it seem as though Marx believed that communism is X, when in reality, he left it much more open ended. This brings me to the next point: Ryan made a massive error in conflating communism with the dictatorship of the proleteriat(dotp). Making this conflation turns communism into something entirely contradictory and non-sensical. Making an error of this magnitude makes me seriously question his intellectual honesty. He also seriously misunderstood the dotp itself, as well as the Marxist conception of the "state". I'll go point by point: First, communism is not the dotp. This image of the flipped pyramid Ryan kept showing is the dotp. But this cannot be communism. As he discussed, communism is the abolition of private property, and class is how we relate to private property. Therefore, communism is inherently classless. Following from this, if communism is classless, how can there be a class of proletariat on top? There cannot be, that would be contradictory. In order to transition from capitalism into communism, there must be a transitionary period. In this period, the proletariat seize state power and begin working towards communism. Ryan characterizes communism as a society where the state owns everything and forces you to work, paying everyone equally. This is a result of him cherry picking quotes, some describing communism, others describing the dotp. In reality, communism would necessarily lack class, money, and a state, making Ryan's claims entirely incorrect. This ties into the Marxist conception of the state: Marx understood the state simply as a manifestation of class power. The government is simply one example of how class power manifests. Thus, when class ceases to exist, so must the state. When Marx discusses the dotp seizing state power, it is simply having the proletariat expressing their class power, rather than the bourgeoise, as it is in our capitalist society. The dotp would see the proleteriat controlling government, in the same exact way as the bourgeoise control our current government. The dotp is therefore no more "totalitarian" or "undemocratic" than any modern day bourgeois country. Additionally, Ryan uses quotes from the manifesto and the principles of communism frequently, but these pamphlets were not written as theoretical proposals. They were calls to action meant be distributed and read by workers, they were effectively pieces of propoganda. Here, Marx and Engels do propose some ideas for a dotp, mainly the 10 point program in the manifesto. But again this should not be seen as part of Marx's theories. He said as much himself in a later preface to the Manifesto: "The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today". In fact, after the Paris commune, Marx criticized centralized state power as something originating from the struggle against feudalism. He claimed that in a dotp, "the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes". Clearly Marx envisioned the dotp as having a state much different from the state that we know currently. To write off even just the dotp as "totalitarian" is a gross misrepresentation of Marx. In short, Ryan attempted to present Marxism objectively, but in reality he fully intended on leveling criticisms against it. His criticisms, however, stem entirely from a poor understanding or a willful misrepresentation of Marx. He is a conservative idealogue who hides behind this guise of objectivity. It is generally a bad idea to learn about a political concept from someone who opposes that concept.

[@somenerdguy]

@@ryebread3417 thanks for the thought out reply. i do think your concerns are valid and i'm not informed enough to be able to add anything more to the conversation. i also think that the simplification of The Communist Manifesto and how much time spent emphasizing it wasn't very helpful to the conversation, but i don't think it is something to completely brush to the side either. we can't just listen to the parts we like and ignore the parts we don't like, in fact, that's one of my biggest criticisms of religions. as for calling Ryan a conservative ideologue, i'm not sure that is correct. the enlightening nature of his content is that it tries to poke holes in the beliefs he appears to have (left-leaning anti-capitalist) and discovers issues along the way. in this video he is specifically trying to poke holes in Marxism and in doing so uncovered some uncomfortable wording with Marx's agitprop. for what it is worth, Ryan does bring up some of your criticisms in the pinned comment of this video. it might be worth while to bring up your issues with him directly.

[@joejones9520]

@@ryebread3417 marx's whole theory has been proven to be a fallacy; mathematically it simply cant work. He couldnt even control his own finances which were achieved by capitalist labor via Engel's so of course he was incapable of creating a coherent economic system; his whole life was a paradox.

[@randomdude2540]

Please make more content. I can't get enough!

[@toplobster1040]

Heyyyy I requested this! Thank you Mr. Chapman!

[@vertigosun9267]

Thank you for your time and knowledge put into these videos

[@hannesknofel8408]

I would absolutely love to see a video on feudalism. It seems like an important topic for understanding the new emerging market forms of the 19 hundrets

[@praxlandy]

it’s really not important to understand the market since they’re incompatible

[@dragonvliss2426]

Feudalosm in Marxism is only distantly related to what historians define as Feudalism. As a medieval historian, I think it is important to see that.

[@georgesdelatour]

Here is Michael Bakunin, the revolutionary anarchist and contemporary of Marx in the International Workingmen’s Association, explaining in 1869 how Marx’s ten-point program in the Communist Manifesto has a built-in tendency to create a totalitarian state. His descriptions feel eerily prescient of the USSR in the 1930s. Marx was fully aware of Bakunin’s criticisms and wilfully chose to ignore them. Instead he had Bakunin expelled: “The reasoning of Marx ends in absolute contradiction…. To appropriate all the landed property and capital, and to carry out its extensive economic and political programs, the revolutionary State will have to be very powerful and highly centralised. The State will administer and direct the cultivation of the land, by means of its salaried officials commanding armies of rural workers organised and disciplined for this purpose. At the same time, on the ruins of the existing banks, it will establish a single state bank which will finance all labour and national commerce.” “It is readily apparent how such a seemingly simple plan of organisation can excite the imagination of the workers, who are as eager for justice as they are for freedom; and who foolishly imagine that the one can exist without the other; as if, in order to conquer and consolidate justice and equality, one could depend on the efforts of others, particularly on governments, regardless of how they may be elected or controlled, to speak and act for the people! For the proletariat this will, in reality, be nothing but a barracks: a regime, where regimented working men and women will sleep, wake, work, and live to the beat of a drum; where the shrewd and educated will be granted government privileges; and where the mercenary-minded, attracted by the immensity of the international speculations of the state bank, will find a vast field for lucrative, underhanded dealings.”

[@usarmyveteran177]

Bingo. Marx was a fascist and all totalitarian, socialist progressives, communist, soon turn fascist. The state cannot control free enterprise.

[@asielnorton345]

bakunin was right on this issue, however he was also deeply antisemitic. this videos focus, and most people's knowledge of Marx in the USA and western Europe are completely centered on the manifesto, which is indeed a piece of propaganda. Marx's real philosophical work is das kapital. his main intellectual focus wasn't predicting how future civilizations would look.

[@georgesdelatour]

@@asielnorton345 1) Marx also held antisemitic, slavophobic, and racist views. Nathaniel Weyl’s book, “Karl Marx, Racist”, gives numerous examples. 2) Marx supervised three editions of the Communist Manifesto (and Engels several more after Marx’s death). It’s clearly not a marginal text in Marxism.

[@asielnorton345]

@@georgesdelatour marx was jewish. marxist philosophy (as in the writing of karl marx) has absolutely nothing to do with race. it is international and class based completely. i have never read the book you mentioned but i've read marx. one could make the case that it is anti religious. but not anti any specific religion. he was materialist, not a romanticist nor an idealist. ideas about the differences of different kinds of people were of no interest to his philosophy. later people added ideas like intersectionality but marx himself really didnt have any interest in this line of thinking. i never said marx had nothing to do with the manifesto, or that it ran contrary to his beliefs. what i said was it wasn't his central work. anyone who's spent any time at all looking at marx realizes that his work primarily revolves around looking at how history and society moves, offering a theory that it moves materially, looking at various modes of production, and offering a critique of capitalism. he also said capitalism was actually better than any system before it. but in hegelian fashion he believed that history progresses: there are faults with capitalism. and the vast majority of his writings are dedicated to historical materialism and showing the faults with capitalism. he often says himself he doesnt know what the future will exactly be, or what the revolution will exactly look like. he did write the manifesto, he did believe what he wrote in the manifesto, but it isnt his central philosophical work. his central work is das kapital.

[@asielnorton345]

it should be added that i believe bakunin was right in his critique. never said or wrote he wasn't.

[@adamnoble1689]

What a great jazzy opening. Love you Chapman. You are a good man trying to lay & splay. Lay & splay. So valuable. It helps me. ... Love you man.

[@donny_doyle]

I am a recent Ryan convert/ fan/ homie... such well presented info, and so calm... no yelling and raging and name calling. So refreshing, y'all agree?

[@MRCAB]

Man, your videos are so good.

[@turnipslop3822]

I've learned so much from this channel in the short time since I discovered it. Truly incredible videos filled with a calm unbiased professional explanation on complex subjects. Looking forward to more!

[@ryebread3417]

This is far from unbiased! Please check other sources or even read these works yourself!

[@haiscore2614]

@@ryebread3417 Breadtube is full of hyper-partisan brain rot. This channel acts as a breath of fresh air from listening to pundits go on and on about "leftism" while a lot of them haven't even read a thing.

[@ryebread3417]

@@haiscore2614 wow its crazy how youtube channels centered around leftism would go on and on about leftism. Any breadtuber's understanding of Marx is significantly more correct than this channel. Believe or not, Marxists tend to have an intimate understanding of Marxism. U can criticize leftists for being partisan or whatever, but that's the whole fucking point lmfao. Their entire channels are dedicated to a specific cause. At least they are transparent about that and don't try to appear objective or unbiased when they arent. But ofc its only "partisan" when it's something you disagree with.

[@hybridh9702]

yeah i thought this stuff was good at first. but he makes a lot of logical jumps and conveniently leaves out a lot of things.

[@seneynah]

He definitely comes across biased, but if you’re any kind of critical thinker, you would know the rational conclusion to Marxism is totalitarian. Why? Because the masses can’t control society, therefore somebody’s going to have to represent the masses interest which would be a totalitarian regime as we’ve seen attempted mid last century. You get a cult of personality that represents the masses and then they seize control and go evil dictator. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. And yes, today we have democracy bought and paid for by those in power which represents the capitalist “dictators” the quietly maintaining the status quo in their benefit. The system we have is far from ideal but so far the capitalist dictators haven’t been inspiring mass murder so there’s that. The good news is we don’t have only factories anymore for the working class, we’re in the next epoch of digital era. We are no longer in the industrial age so the digital era brings back the artisans you no longer have to work in the factories if you don’t want, you can create income as an artisan online or in a skilled trade, many options for people besides being a proletariat. It seems though there seems to be a marriage of capitalism with the social justice warrior Marxist to grab more property from your average Citizen through loss of property rights for landlords which became evident during and after Covid restrictions. The capitalist are simply using the Marxists to grab more property. Please don’t be a useful idiot! It’s nothing but a power grab by the already uber powerful. I’m a small landlord, it’s killing us and making Blackrock even richer.

[@ohar94]

This is a fantastic channel. Keep at it!

[@troycook3933]

Ryan, you are a champion of credibility because of your humble and honest approach. I appreciate these videos a ton! Please keep up the good work :)

[@seanleith5312]

What Is Marxism? It's the most evil thing in the history of mankind.

[@ryebread3417]

This creator's understanding of Marx is not correct, and I would even go as far as to suspect that he is being intentionally dishonest.

[@elifarnsworth8762]

Clearly you have no comprehension of what humble means?...

[@ditkovichpaysmyrent]

@@ryebread3417 what if you gave some specific criticisms rather than baseless claims?

[@ryebread3417]

@@ditkovichpaysmyrent i did already, here they are again: There were a few issues here and there in the beginning, but it was mainly towards the end where things fell apart. For one thing, this idea that Marxism includes some vision of a communist society is largely untrue. Marxism centers around historical materialism, through which we can make some general speculation as to how the force of history will continue, but Marx did not see communism as some set society that we must work towards. To quote Marx: "Communism is for us not a state of affairs which is to be established, an ideal to which reality [will] have to adjust itself. We call communism the real movement which abolishes the present state of things. The conditions of this movement result from the premises now in existence". By this, he means that there is no set communist "state of affairs" that we must shape society to fit. Instead, we are merely following the flow of history, and this flow will eventually lead us out of capitalism. Instead of actually investigating or critiquing historical materialism, Ryan dismissed Marx as a "fortune teller". He made it seem as though Marx believed that communism is X, when in reality, he left it much more open ended. This brings me to the next point: Ryan made a massive error in conflating communism with the dictatorship of the proleteriat(dotp). Making this conflation turns communism into something entirely contradictory and non-sensical. Making an error of this magnitude makes me seriously question his intellectual honesty. He also seriously misunderstood the dotp itself, as well as the Marxist conception of the "state". I'll go point by point: First, communism is not the dotp. This image of the flipped pyramid Ryan kept showing is the dotp. But this cannot be communism. As he discussed, communism is the abolition of private property, and class is how we relate to private property. Therefore, communism is inherently classless. Following from this, if communism is classless, how can there be a class of proletariat on top? There cannot be, that would be contradictory. In order to transition from capitalism into communism, there must be a transitionary period. In this period, the proletariat seize state power and begin working towards communism. Ryan characterizes communism as a society where the state owns everything and forces you to work, paying everyone equally. This is a result of him cherry picking quotes, some describing communism, others describing the dotp. This resulting description of communism makes no sense. In reality, communism would necessarily lack class, money, and a state, making Ryan's claims entirely incorrect. This ties into the Marxist conception of the state: Marx understood the state simply as a manifestation of class power. The government is simply one example of how class power manifests. Thus, when class ceases to exist, so must the state. When Marx discusses the dotp seizing state power, it is simply having the proletariat expressing their class power, rather than the bourgeoise, as it is in our capitalist society. The dotp would see the proleteriat controlling government, in the same exact way as the bourgeoise control our current government. The dotp is therefore no more "totalitarian" or "undemocratic" than any modern day bourgeois country. Additionally, Ryan uses quotes from the manifesto and the principles of communism frequently, but these pamphlets were not written as theoretical proposals. They were calls to action meant be distributed and read by workers, they were effectively pieces of propoganda. Here, Marx and Engels do propose some ideas for a dotp, mainly the 10 point program in the manifesto. But again this should not be seen as part of Marx's theories. He said as much himself in a later preface to the Manifesto: "The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today". In fact, after the Paris commune, Marx criticized centralized state power as something originating from the struggle against feudalism. He claimed that in a dotp, "the working class cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes". Clearly Marx envisioned the dotp as having a state much different from the state that we know currently. To write off even just the dotp as "totalitarian" is a gross misrepresentation of Marx. In short, Ryan attempted to present Marxism objectively, but in reality he fully intended on leveling criticisms against it. His criticisms, however, stem entirely from a poor understanding or a willful misrepresentation of Marx. He is a conservative idealogue who hides behind this guise of objectivity. It is generally a bad idea to learn about a political concept from someone who opposes that concept.

[@jstevinik3261]

The best characterization of private property is that is property used for capital, in contrast to personal property that has no capital value, such as toothbrushes. Marx was ambiguous of the form of governance, aside from needing to be pro-revolutionary working class.

[@Zhicano]

This dude is sus. I just literally watched him make shit up while posting highlighted quotes that don’t corroborate with what he says.

[@jstevinik3261]

@@Zhicano Who? Ryan Chapman?

[@Zhicano]

@@jstevinik3261 yes

[@jstevinik3261]

@@Zhicano I have been considering to make a comment post to this video. Since have expressed a big cliam on the guy, maybe could make a lengthy comment to crotique video.

[@Zhicano]

@@jstevinik3261 I was think about going over what he said and making a video in response and I’ve never made one against something that someone had said. This is pure nonsense being peddled and people are gobbling it up because he has “citations”. All I see is cherry picking, straw manning and heavy biases based off popular and false conceptions of Marx and Engels works.

[@isaacinternet]

Your analysis and your conclusion omitted the current working conditions in the global south and developing nations and how the conditions of the people producing most products live in conditions not dissimilar to the workers of Marx's time. You also omitted the fact that the economic divide between the rich and the poor has grown tremendously. The richest man in Marx's lifetime, I believe was, William Vanderbilt, who in today's money, would have an estimated $6.2 billion. The richest person, as I post this, is Elon Musk, who has $238 billion. It's true global proverty levels have decreased over time, but income inequality is not decreasing. If Marx's goal was to eliminate economic inequality, ensure workers have meaningful jobs, and end the subjugation of working people, Marx's fundemental ideas about and analysis of society still apply to our current conditions. Even though capitalism's appearance has changed shape in some ways, it still functions essentially as it did in Marx's time.

[@soulcapitalist6204]

The $100M fortune of Vanderbilt at the time he died is adjusted to $2.9T in 2023.

[@isaacinternet]

@@soulcapitalist6204 incorrect

[@theodordimov6518]

ah, yes, income inequality... the ultimate problem right🤦‍♂

[@andreasvicker7064]

Amazing video and great work!!! More like this!

[@WisdomFromAshes]

Terrific treatment of a big subject. Love it.

[@cj4108]

Only just seeing this now. Your understanding, and presentation of, the topics you discuss, tends to be a breath of fresh air. Keep going.

[@a_lot-of_pp]

me when my idea of fresh air is the 19th century backalleys of london

[@bobirnasimov9421]

Amazing ! Thanks for clarifying so much.

[@blairsimpkins3505]

I have binge watched each of your videos. Your detailed analysis without getting into the politics and slick editing really gave me excellent education into poly-sci. Thank you and keep up the good work.

[@ryebread3417]

Please do not just accept the understanding of some random youtuber! His understanding of Marxism is wildly incorrect!

[@bookworm8415]

@@ryebread3417 ok... um. So what specifically do you have an issue with... since this is an exact distilled summary of communism and traditional marxism. This video, combined with historical summaries and statistical analysis of each communist experiment as applied through a variety of cultures and time periods and methods and adaptations paints a clear picture of how each of these ideas are applied and interpreted within modern and semi modern contexts. So again... what specifically do you have issues with? I found literally zero errors... which is an insane level of detail and careful summary.

[@ryebread3417]

@@bookworm8415 well if YOU found zero errors, surely it is a completely accurate and fair representation of Marxism.

[@noobzie8963]

@@ryebread3417 what are the eroors that you found?

[@notarealAlbanian]

@BookWorm84 it's mostly what he left out of the video that makes it flawed. not once did he mention that communism is a statless society. also, he never gave examples of how marx's ideas inspired revolutions or new theory, instead he gave one example of some america college students, which was disappointing.

[@cdiers26]

This was really great and seemingly unbiased. I'm kinda disappointed in how simple, ideologically driven, and illogical Marx was. I'm not really sure how young educated people might become so entranced with Marx and Marxism. There are massive leaks in logic for someone who claimed to be devoted to logic and science in his work. He totally neglected to account for people's desire to work in the first place once they are removed from artisan style work. Even though he talks about those effects directly, he somehow forgets by the time he gets to "according to their ability and need". Why would anyone want to continue working to their ability if their needs are met. The surplus of labor/property is still going to be created and if you only get what you need out of it you'd still feel ripped off or demotivated. People need reasons to work to create more than they need to. Family, status, luxuries, etc. Those needs are not unique to capitalism. As for historicism; he couldn't see the future, but communism always fails and hierarchies never cease to exist.

[@tomio8072]

I think the argument for why people would work even if they had all of their needs met - if this is the question - is that fundamentally humans seek struggle to fulfil themselves in life. If you have all of your needs met it may be pretty boring to sit and do nothing, thus you'd probably want to do things with your time. As with hierarchies, I do personally believe hierarchies are a key component of societies, but hierarchies have been organised in many different ways all throughout different societies. One model leftists have developed is the flow democracy, the idea that a fluid mix of both representative democracy and direct democracy may be used, perhaps akin to the structure the Paris commune took on. Of course though the past is there to be learnt from, so we will inevitably find we want to do things differently in different areas

[@VladVexler]

Vlad here, philosopher. Just want to congratulate Ryan on the video as a step into the subject. Marx of course said that ''philosophy stands to the study of the real world in the same relationship as masturbation stands to real sexual love', and it's not clear what positive role he saw for philosophy. For him it was secondary to empirical inquiry into the logic of capitalism & the sociology of supersession. I highly recommend a tiny taste here on KZbin of Raymond Geuss's lectures on Marx. Raymond is more sympathetic to Marx than I, but his passion for avoiding bullshit & placing us in history is infectious. Congratulations again!

[@jonahkhalley]

Fancy seeing you here! :D

[@soulcapitalist6204]

Marx was a butcher of philosophy in his body of work. It's funny to hear his aims described as exploring logic when he most brutally butchered socratic standards of rational philosophy. He also butchered hegelian dialectic with his idea (dialectic materialism) that dialectic was somehow social phenomenon versus a contrived intellectual process. As an overarching example, Marx submits several ad lapidems by reviving debunked theory and ignoring the emiricism which deprecated them. It makes me laugh reading Marx described as having pursued empiricism when he cowered so desperately away from the empirical methods of his orthodox economic colleagues of the time. I more customarily understand Marx to be a case in point as to the superiority of empirical methods over the heterodox normative approaches used throughout marxian theory.

[@mar25947]

This explanation was EXCELLENT! Very through. Subscribed! 😁

[@Taysky]

There are so many fantastic things about this video- great job! Your approach to accurate understanding is amazing and so important in a solid education.

[@dominicgunderson]

But his end analysis is inaccurate.

[@soulcapitalist6204]

@@dominicgunderson Seems pretty spot on, actually. Marxists are generally folks with poor reading of Karl Marx's works and typically respond to better informed people by pointing out that they are not inline with their favorite source of marxist propaganda - youtube videos and charlatans like Noam Chomsky and Richard Wolff. What Marxists cannot do is quote Karl Marx to the effect they have been led to embrace. It's easy to quote Marx's unequivocal call for brutal, totalitarian dictatorship, just by picking from his war with social democrats and liberal democracy altogether.

[@fredwelf8650]

My main objection was when you characterized Marx and Marxism as totalitarian. Karl Marx did not discuss death camps, concentration camps or the Gulag? Isn't is doubtful whether Marx anticipated events like Lenin's vanguard party and Stalin's purges or the gulag? Marxism was characterized as totalitarian by the Cold War liberals who failed to glean the similarities between Soviet marxism and National Socialism. It was Stalin, Hitler and Mao who were totalitarian and none of them used Marx’ economic theory. The issue is that Marxism, and you take time to clarify the distinction between Marx, Marxists and Marxism, is composed of Marx's works, his sources, and many different historical events and persons. There is Soviet Marxism, there is Eastern Marxism, there is Western Marxism, there is Cuban Marxism, there is American Marxism, and all of these Marxisms can be compared and contrasted to different versions of a "Communist Party." The actual political history cannot be explained simply by Marx's theory! The use of the term 'Marxism' does not refer to totalitarianism because it also refers to the only resistance to totalitarianism. Lastly, Marx did not simply characterize Marxism as composed of either socialists or communists. Did he not at least recognize anarchists? Did he not also include Democrats and the process of democratization? There is a mystified relation between Marxism and totalitarianism. It is disingenuous to claim that the heart of Marx's ideas is the Communist Manifesto - which has been cherry-picked to death - and ignore his major works on economic theory, namely surplus value, while failing to characterize this work holistically. It is also wildly inaccurate to discuss Marxism without addressing Western Marxism.

[@jefflanahan8812]

I am trying to understand your comment honestly with regard to the relationship between Marx's ideas and totalitarianism. Are you saying basically that Marx's ideas aren't themselves totalitarian, but that iterations of political regimes that became totalitarian (stalin, mao, lenin, cuba, et. al.) failed in some way or another to properly implement the ideas? Or, co-opted the ideas for their own totalitarian project? Something else?

[@fredwelf8650]

@@jefflanahan8812 I think it is very obvious - Marxism should be sharply distinguished from communism. Nowhere does Marx mention a vanguard party, instead he talks about a well-organized proletarian leadership which took the form of unions in the 1800's. The communist ideal as discussed by the early Marx is not the same as Lenin's (from Kautsky) notion of the vanguard party. Chapman did was to present a version of Marxism by picking out certain phrases from the Communist Manifesto, a document from the young Marx. Chapman specifically stated that he was not going to address the mature Marx?! Anyway, the point is that Marx's works considered in his historical period, and events related to his works which occurred in the 20th century were hardly based on his ideas. The best example is the issue of the primacy of class struggle which most every Marxist from Lenin to Althusser acknowledges is the central issue in history, the wheel of Historical Materialism: Marx's key insight. Class struggle takes particular forms/appearances at different times in history. The class struggle in Russia circa 1905-1917 is different from the class struggle in the 1920's between the Communist Party and the two worker groups: farmers and industrial workers. The Cuban Revolution does not only involve the US puppet Batista but the international mafias as well which Castro kicked out. The Chinese Revolution pitted the Nationalists led by Chiang Kia-Shek - intermission fight against the Japs - continue the Revolution and the long change of the culture through Mao's reforms from agrarian to industrialization, and then from poverty to middle class diffusion and a capitalist-communist nation-state. The class struggle took the form of different social and economic classes conflicting within the leadership and within the population in each historical situation. But, the scientific socialist "law" of historical change via class struggle is different in each concrete particular moment and place. Marx could not possibly anticipate these particulars and although these "Marxist" leaders used Marx as a springboard, it is a leap (no pun) to infer that their policies were based on Marx's ideas. In sum, the communist parties of the 20th century hardly resemble Marx's ideas of dictatorship of the proletariat which implied Democracy: government by the people. Ironically, the only real instance of a proletarian dictator was Hitler. What is overlooked is that Marxism was cohered to refer to the USSR and Red China. However, Marxism took many different forms in Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Cuba, Southern Asia, and America. In these latter instances, Marxism was used against the totalitarian forms in Russia and China, and especially against the Nazi's. The only real resistance to patriarchy, capitalism and liberal political leadership has been Marxism in its emancipatory form. One of the best cases of this difference was between Trotsky and Stalin. Like Marx, Trotsky spelled out in detail the important moral issues in persuing liberation. Trotsky's was the only real voice against Stalinism in the 20's and 30's. The rest of the Marxists had their hands full with Nazism! US conservative extremist turned the word 'Marxism' to mean unions, even Democrats, and communists and socialists, after WWII because before and during WWII, they were allies! My main point is that Marxism must be understood as a complex of variants, some good and some bad, and not as a monolith, and certainly not as Marx's original theory of history, economics, or politics. Where Alvin Gouldner talks about two Marxisms, read. Lastly, what is obscured with all of these historical happenings and theoretical asides, is the everyday changes in the lives of the peoples concerning their occupations, their families, their marriages and their social relations. When Marx talks about the topsy-turvy world of capitalism with its fetishism, commodification, social domination, mystification, expropriation, and alienation, he is not only referring to the social relations between workers under capitalism, but to the supposedly more rational and decent institutional arrangements under communism. Such a peaceful state of affairs never occurred. While the USSR mocked the US over its racism, it applied severe anti-semitic punishments and should be understood as having an equivalent genocidal effect as Nazi Germany. But, the maelstrom in social relations, e.g. sexual behavior, that occurred after these various revolutions is repulsive: Soviet families disintegrated, Cuba persecuted homosexuals with a vengeance, China underwent an abortion epidemic. All of the maladies that Marx specified as horrific under capitalism were doubly worse under these new regimes. It was only where the themes of emancipation and liberation were implemented by the left that a resistance to capitalist and communist institutional confusion restored a sense of order and fairness. The impetus for this orderliness were the unions, the social movements that threatened the political sphere, the educational system which improved literacy and above all publications in higher ed, and the civil sphere of journalism, TV and radio, that spread the news of corruption and brutality which embarrassed the political class and led to legal and financial changes.The communist ideal as discussed by the early Marx is not the same as Lenin's (from Kautsky) notion of the vanguard party.

[@jefflanahan8812]

@@fredwelf8650 I grant you all of that: Marx's ideas were extraordinarily complex, and to boil it down to, "well basically what happened is 'x'" is a partial understanding at best. But it seems to me, if a dictatorship of the proletariat is what Marx in part sought, and you are going to make the claim that Adolf Hitler was an example of a real proletarian dictator, you are going to have a real hard time convincing anyone that Marx's ideas should be taken seriously at all, no matter what era of Marx's writings you wish to elevate. Regarding Marx's idea that the dictatorship of the proletariat implied democracy: democracy can certainly be tyrannical and dictatorial. Any majority can vote to burn those they despise and call it democracy. To imply Marx could not foresee the horrors of Leninism or Stalinism or Maoism, is to ignore that fact that he argued for things like "the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions", or to achieve his ends through "revolutionary terror", or that in countries which lacked strong democratic institutions (which would certainly describe Russia and China) "the lever of revolution must be force". Of course, revolutions are often violent, no matter the political persuasion of those involved. The idea that individuals have the right to revolt if they are denied political expression is hard to argue with. Obviously, how else can african slaves free themselves from the chains of 18th century landowners than by use of force? But the crux of the issue, for me, isn't just that revolutions inspired by Marxist leaders lead to blood and terror: it's the decades and decades that follow that are filled with it as well in the form of famine, collapsed institutions, inefficient production, and lack of basic needs being met. It is the ideas themselves that simply do not work to bring about anything that resembles the kind of prosperity unleased in a regulated capitalist economy. In my view, capitalism is the most just and fair form of wealth distribution ever conceived. What you have in regulated capitalism is individual people redistributing the fruits of their own labor all the time, with the freedom to choose to whom and for what purpose they redistribute them. Communism abolishes private property and leaves the state as the arbiter of who gets what. Capitalism takes into account the needs of all individuals as best as possible by enforcing and directing changes in prices, wages, and other commodities without the direction of any one person or group. Communism attempts to direct recourses toward specific needs of individuals, which when done without the information disseminated through markets, is impossible, and always fails. Capitalism is what you get when individuals are free to to engage with their society according to their own needs and desires. Communism claims only by it's definition to attend to the needs and desires of individuals, but has no clue how to provide them. Capitalist societies incentivize progress and innovation through the promise of profit, income, and freedom. Communism provides no incentive for anyone to produce anything in a quantity sufficient to distribute among it's citizens in a just manner. Capitalist societies allow for businesses to fail, so that poor quality or inefficiently produced goods and services can be eliminated from circulation, so better businesses can thrive through competition. Communist societies leave people with few choices and bread lines. Capitalism takes into account at it's fundamental level of operation natural human instincts such as greed and desire to satisfy ones own needs before the needs of others. Communism construes these human instincts as products of capitalism, argues for the elimination of these human instincts through the elimination of capitalism, which leaves members of a communist society with a system that has abolished the very thing that provides the constraints on instincts such as greed. To argue Marxism should be distinguished from Communism is a fair point. But distinguished is not the same thing as being inextricably linked, which Marxism and communism most certainly are.

[@fredwelf8650]

@@jefflanahan8812 Your argument about the superiority of capitalism is weak. For example, the USSR in about 20 years industrialized and produced a military organization, with all of the requisite logistics for its population, to defeat the Nazi's while taking a hit of over 20M deaths, then it challenged US hegemony. Communist China, the largest nation on Earth, has in about 70 years developed economically and socially to challenge the US and the West. If it is/was superior, why the Cold War? Why the panic today over China's predominance? Why irks me about your take is not just that you, like Chapman, reiterate cherry picked claims from the 1844 Communist Manifesto and ignore his mature works - this indicates your fixation of belief, and also ignore what he actually said. He does not claim to abolish private property, just the private property of the large land holders and the capitalists. The average person may still own their home! He says this in the Communist Manifesto just below Chapman's highlighted extraction. State regulated capitalism is the norm, not some wild free market. In this sense, Marx was correct - democracy slowly works for the benefit of the people against the capitalist class, obviously. I don't think you read holistically and interpret based on everything he says. Also, my main point was that there is scant relation between Marx and the Communists. If you are trying to posit a connection between Marx and Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Castro, etc., then you have to focus on the common area - on the primacy of the class struggle. You do not address this as if history goes happily along wherever the capitalists rule. But, this is not true. Poverty is widespread under capitalism. Under European socialism, there is hardly any poverty. We will see if China produces the middle class it is seeking; it is likely as it is wiping out all vestiges of poverty. This is not to valorize communism but to recognize that the critique of capitalism produces welcome reforms, similar to welfare in the US. The perversion is that corporate welfare dwarfs the safety net. Lastly, Marx's statements must be taken in context and applied skeptically to the future. The links between Marx and Marxism are mediated by a complex of decisions and events which include liberal values and pragmatic consequences. The left has intervened effectively into rampant monopoly capitalism and counters it at every step, but the situation of the class struggle between capitalists, and between capitalists and workers, especially in terms of International Relations, can be observed daily in crises, wars, and crime rates. If you are going to pronounce on Marxism, at least get the history and the everyday lived experience of people right. I recommend Volume 1 of Capital where the critique of poverty is stark.

[@deathvalleydruids892]

@@fredwelf8650 I see where you're coming from, but I have to defend Ryan here. I think that both his interpretation of the texts and his arguments for the totalitarian implications of Marxism are sound. Totalitarianism follows as a matter of course whenever any attempt is made to put some version of Marxist communism into practice as a political program. The reason for this is that Marx, for all his undeniable brilliance in many other respects, had a piss poor understanding of human nature. Marx may not explicitly promote totalitarianism as part of his utopian fantasy involving "the withering away of the state," but in actuality any "well-organized proletarian leadership" will invariably confront a situation that the Marxian analysis gets terribly wrong: Following the supposed emancipation from the chains of bourgeois capitalism, huge groups of the population tend have a _very_ different and totally unanticipated variety of ideas regarding their own needs and abilities. It is at these moments that the theoretical defects of Marxism become manifest within most of the historical attempts to realize its political ideals. This predicament leaves the leaders of the new regime with two alternatives: A) lawless anarchy or B) the institution of totalitarian rule until the masses fall in line. There can be no third alternative featuring some romantic idealization of a "democratic" regime harmonized by "labor unions," "worker co-ops," or some other special organization since this repeats the initial doctrinal defect: there's no guarantee that enough people will choose to participate in these institutions to sustain the communist society. This is why Marxism tends towards totalitarianism in spite of itself. You'd need to either provide or point me towards a convincing defense of Marx's anthropology to change my mind, until then I'd say Chapman has a tighter grasp on this point.

[@meatrackgames]

Ryan seems like someone who is genuinely interested in presenting material in as much of an unbiased view as possible. Some mistakes were made on this topic. It's hard, if not impossible to cover a topic as dense as Marxism in 32 mins. Go to the source if you want to learn more!

[@SwedishDrunkard5963]

"some mistakes" he compleatly mischaractizes marxism saying its when really big state, communism is a stateless, moneyless and classless society where the people own the means of production. he ignores massive parts of what marx said to make his little idea of what he wants it to be

[@dorianphilotheates3769]

Only now stumbled onto your excellent channel- just subscribed! Greetings from Greece.

[@justing1810]

Thank you for explaining this. Excellent Job 👍

[@mikealexander1935]

But Marx's economics is a key part of his ideology because that is where the empirical facts and analysis that underlie his scientific, materialist conceptualizations, Marx's argument lives or dies on the strength of his economics. This is why the man spent so much time on it. His early philosophical writings in 1844 provide the motivation for his life's work and his political stance and theoretical paradigm, but they have little to say on the validity of his arguments that supposed to be *scientific* not philosophical.

[@jeremyinvictus]

Yes, that's right, and it's why Marxism is garbage. It's all built on the lie of exploitation.

[@scottpadgett4711]

@Danger Disgusto I looked for your videos to explain but alas nothing

[@bookworm8415]

@Danger Disgusto so... what would you add or change with this summary. You claim its dishonest... even though its a literal and careful analysis of his methodology and thinking without diving into the technical aspects underlying the theory. To do that would require an additional video... which he mentions. This seemed a near perfect summary and factually accurate to a degree that is frankly astounding. What specifically do you have issues with and what sources would resolve your points?

[@TheCablebill]

@@scottpadgett4711 perhaps you should have looked for someone else's videos, but alas, unmotivated.

[@TheCablebill]

One way to make an effective polemic is (to try) to be subtle.

[@griffenssfantasy2787]

I have just recently heard of Marxism and was extremely curious to what it was. I am not a 'political, statistical, religious..ect' person. In all honesty it's so complicated I can't understand most things in the slightest to even try to learn about it more. I have comprehension issues, learning disabilities, But you have managed to explain this in the simplest way possible that I understood everything that you said because not only did you read the words would you elaborated more on the words. Even examples at the end. Thank you❤️

[@th232r6]

Marxism is the road to poverty, slavery, famine and death. It is an ideology that builds walls to keep people in. Historically people risk all to escape Marxism, the lucky few are the most feared by leftist ideologue's.

[@alanrobinson2087]

This was the best explanation of Marxism I’ve found in over 4 years of trying to get a better understanding of it. Thank you for putting in the effort to learn and teach!

[@widepootis]

Very cool video, it definitely helped clear some confusion

[@openmicdiscussions5397]

I just found your channel and I love how you present the information in a manner that is educational and presented in an unbiased manner. Thank you

[@eterista3868]

Also in Marx's times physical punishments were practised by employers. And not just in his times, my grandpa was telling me long time ago that his father working in Škoda factory in Czechoslovakia was once - for "working too slowly" - hung by his hands from ceiling for three hours in the entrance hall of the building so everyone saw him as an example. Similar things were happening before second world war all over the Europe. I hope we will never get back to it, but in this world you really never know. God bless.

[@darillus1]

'Hung by his hands from ceiling for three hours in the entrance hall,' talk about workplace bullying!

[@tonywalton1052]

Skoda was never a great car.

[@BrianRenardDavis]

We At The Point Where Folk Would Fight Back.

[@lifecloud2]

Good point, eterista. I think a lot of people forget the times Marx lived through.

[@namyx_71]

@@tonywalton1052 the Škoda he's talking about is škoda plzeň, train, tram, ship cannon building...

[@SnakeNbake]

Amazing! Very well done!

[@francisco4194]

Thank you for breaking this down very well explained 👍

[@vanyac6448]

Well, about your early analysis of the situation in Marx's time vs. Locke's: Your analysis may have been true in the United States and Great Britain, but I'm not sure how true it was in Germany and in Russia, where Marxism was stronger and more popular among workers than in the former two. Germany and Russia weren't liberal countries, both had strong monarchies. And the governments there weren't non-interventionist. They were interventionist - on behalf of the elite. Like in Russia, protest could be dispersed by gunfire wherever they occurred. And, exploitative power structures there predated industrialization, especially in Russia. Russia still had serfdom until the 1860s, and serfs were little better than slaves. So I think the background is a little more complicated than you made it out to be, especially considering that Marx was German.

[@ReformedHistorian]

Marx predicted the worker’s revolution would occur in industrialized countries, so I don’t think this point is especially valid in this context. A video about communism in practice v philosophical concept, perfect fit.

[@Lars6138]

@@ReformedHistorian Engels predicted that the outcome of WW1 would likely be a communist revolution in Russia, and a number of other things that came to pass, so yeah. People love to pull out one or two things Marx missed on, and conveniently ignore all the other predictions they were right about. Just because a scientist misses once in a while, is that a reason to stop believing in science altogether?

[@Gwyndolin-hk4ql]

@@Lars6138 Not to mention, they weren't really "scientist" as social history is pretty much inspired by Marx. I consider more of a philosopher. His insights on capitalism is really damn accurate considering when he wrote all of that. And what puts he above most of the economists(even now) is his philosophical approach. Economists lack this kind of understanding as they are "trapped" by their angle.🙃

[@Acinnn]

that what I was thinking as well, it's important to see what they were reacting too.

[@rsmlinar1720]

But if everyone has different outlooks on marxism, what combines all marxists together. If a Marxist tries to convince me about marxism and then another Marxist starts arguing with him and describes thing differently, and then another comes and another comes, how am i suppose to support them. And dont say read Marx in deep for yourself, since those marxists have done the same and still disagree. Then i better just dont bother.

[@notrealboris]

most underrated channel on youtube

[@Kriegerdammerung]

I will have many segments of this video written on notebooks!!! This is the best!!! I predict I will watch this video many times more!!!

[@roharatube]

Outstanding! Subscribed!

[@Wowowowowowowo]

I hear Ryan's theme song in the beginning and my day get's a little better.

[@ZedXrdx]

Ryan, you and James Lindsay have been insanely helpful in my goal to understand more theory. IM so glad there is someone to break down these concepts for the layman.

[@muslimmetalman]

theyre kind of oppositional to start and are basing that opposition on understanding the current world more than the historical context of this stuff

[@wellthissucks112]

never heard of this youtuber but I know a lot about James Lindsay. I just started this video. So they are on the same page?

[@Poopmannn]

James Lindsay lmfao

[@jaimekaiser1622]

@@Poopmannn you are such a troll.

[@Poopmannn]

@@jaimekaiser1622 interesting, go on

[@black.sasuke.uchiha]

Haven’t seen the channel before but I like that you are someone who reads a lot. I’ve never actually seen someone define specifically what Marxism is. I just know it’s part of that bubble with socialism, communism, Maoist Stalinist Leninist stuff. I subscribed.

[@ducatipete5404]

Excellent Explanation and Presentation... Will Definitely Follow ✅

[@sanghoonlee5171]

I love this guy for actually giving references for almost everything he explains.

[@hybridh9702]

yeah he is still cherry picking what he explains though to manipulate the narrative. be careful. watch longer videos.

[@__D10S__]

@@hybridh9702 or just read the source material lmao

[@soulcapitalist6204]

@@__D10S__ If marxists actually read what Marx proposed, there wouldn't be so many.

[@TheSeeking2know]

Very important video as always, giving the floor to a useful expression of Marx's ideas to many who may not have ever read his works, but keep hearing him or variations of his ideas invoked. The explanation of "Property" at the beginning was so useful as a foundation for how Marx engaged with that concept. Just reading through the text you highlighted (and the text around that), it was eye-opening to see the terms that are used in so many ways in the modern context.

[@t00bgazer]

Now go read marx and realize this guy made a video deceiving people about marxism.

[@TheSeeking2know]

@@t00bgazer Please explain with specifics.

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

@@TheSeeking2know He did make an error though. In the video he defined Private proparty as capital, not personal belongings, which is correct. But at the end of the video he makes it look like Marx was advocating for no property at all, everything you make is for 'the society'. But that was not Marx' definition.

[@TheSeeking2know]

@@raymondhartmeijer9300 🤔

[@josephcoon5809]

There is a certain level of irony being a “materialist” while discussing something immaterial like “concepts.”

[@frmm123]

This is excellent work, bravo.

[@porchtime504]

Your vids are so concise. It’s so helpful. Thank you.

[@defeatedskeptic311]

For the graph that is used at @30:30, I recommend people what the video "Steven Pinker and the Failure of New Optimism ft. We're in Hell" by Unlearning Economics since it does a deeper dive in to poverty measures and some of the possible concerns about them. The key part of the video starts at around 19:20, but I recommend the whole thing or at least the run-up for context. I really do appreciate the videos Ryan and I think you do your best to make them as unbiased as possible, particularly in the explanation of the theories.

[@whatsinaname691]

Yeah, but their analysis is quite pathetic on it. The idea that we wouldn’t have way more total (less) impoverished people after the population quadrupled is stupid

[@defeatedskeptic311]

@@whatsinaname691 It is fine to have your own opinion, but he brings that up merely to bring up the question of whether quantity or proportion of people suffering from poverty is more important. I think this is a good philosophical question.

[@emilianosintarias7337]

It doesn't really matter though because capitalism made the classes marx was talking about relatively poorer, and today has made people relatively poorer. Absolute poverty is basically a biological measure, it isn't the social question, a worker today is poorer in society than a medieval king, unless he can get in a time machine and bring all his knowledge, vaccinations and fancy toys back to medieval times.

[@leehayes4019]

I also caught that part and wondered who is the "we" he specified.

[@themandontaye]

Very intelligent guy you are. Thank you for the videos. Keep them coming 👏🏼

[@basementracer7622]

I have been watching your channel over the last few weeks as I just found it and I really enjoy your content. Very educational and appropriate for our current "modern" times here in the USA. I do want to ask you something though. Why do you keep saying Epic when the word is Epoc. They have completely different meanings? Please do keep up the great work you are doing in educating us.

[@A_Box]

Hi. It is really a bummer that you left out the Economics of Marx. This is one of the fundamental reasons why Marx is worth paying attention to because you can actually make scientific models that not only model but predict reality. You really cannot get more scientific than that. Case in point: the declining rate of profit. Dr. Paul Cockshott, a former professor of computer science, has an excellent video about it: Look for "Why labour theory of value is right" and "The falling rate of profit" under the channel "Paul Cockshott". PS. I'm not posting links because KZbin may hide the comment.

[@lightfeather9953]

It's been 200 years of falling profit? Capitalism is going to end any day now then you must believe? I'm sure a computer scientist knows something that thousands of economists have failed to realize. Stop being so delusional.

[@A_Box]

@@lightfeather9953 Cockshott is just a voice. A lot of that he points out is out published out there. Yes, the rate of profit falling means that desperation grows in society. Have you taken a look around? Either Capitalism falls or it evolves into Fascism.

[@jonson856]

I dont know man, I think he theory of surplus value is wrong.

[@soulcapitalist6204]

100% of Marx's conjectures were debunked before he debuted them. For example, marxian TRPF crisis was debunked by ricardian business cycle before Marx graduated. 100%

[@Makyura43]

As someone who grew up in communist Yugoslavia it is surreal watching this , because all of the things mentioned were put in practice here. All production became state owned under management of the working class for the working class with profit removed from equation. Sounds good right , who would have thought it would lead to poverty , misery and war. Marx forgot one thing thou , proletariat are still human beings and are at core no better or worse than bourgeoisie. With human greed no longer part of the process , workers started doing just bare minimum each day ( no owner no pay raise - no reason to more than basics ) , same workers were in control of decision making ( why give yourself more work if its not resulting into extra profit ) , no one would ever get fired , social benefits were used than used some more and than some more ( people would spent months each year just on payed sick leave ) , people will bring/hire their family and friends even if there is no real need for new workers. Pretty soon that same factory that belonged to workers somehow now belonged to no one , and stealing became issue. They became so inefficient that factories consumed more than they produced and when everything was spent hyperinflation hit and their work officially became what it was for a while worthless waste of time. Everything collapsed , everyone lost their jobs , money lost value completely , everything that was not pinned to the floor was stolen in resulting chaos.... than war... Grand idea of great intellectual , completely removed from the BASIC FUCKING HUMAN NATURE

[@LajtSejbr]

You look at the 1990s and all the crisis that hit the developing world and your take is socialism is somehow at fault? It's like saying Cuban socialism is a failure because it is being strangled by the US.

[@damobuns7639]

So poverty, misery, and war in a socialist mode of production is due to socialism’s faults. But poverty, misery, and war in a capitalist mode of production isn’t due to capitalism’s faults? It’s just “muh human nature”?

[@Makyura43]

@@damobuns7639 I did not mentioned capitalism once.

[@damobuns7639]

@@Makyura43 do you agree that a) we live in a global capitalist order, and b) we live with poverty, misery, and war?

[@LajtSejbr]

@@Makyura43 Often, what is not mentioned is what is important. Were the Yugoslav successor states socialist or were they nationalist capitalist?

[@soggyherman7454]

im so happy i found this channel

[@BelMountain]

Very helpful and easy to follow video, thank you.

[@elpapichulo4046]

The extreme poverty rate is interesting. I mean what is extreme poverty? To me, it seems a big portion of the global south live in extreme poverty way more than 9% so my guess is on how these papers classify extreme poverty. Relatively speaking compared to 1800 it seems conditions have improved but I don't think that's a good enough for our modern society

[@brown9671]

Poverty is a wierd thing to measure. I don’t know if it’s measure of poverty in the whole world or poverty rates of the people in each country.

[@A_Box]

Ironically enough, most of it is thanks to the CPC (Communist Party of China).

[@Spudeaux]

Extreme poverty is measure of how well basic needs are met, e.g. food, water, shelter, etc, as opposed to what is usually measured, which would be wealth & income.

[@emilianosintarias7337]

poverty is relative, it doesn't make sense to compare it to the past. Instead we can use terms like economic development or deprivation to talk about things like hunger. Capitalism did what marx said it would, ruin many people, drive others into poverty, and make others rich. It also caused economic development. What we have seen since the mid twentieth century is that capitalism itself no longer causes economic development. It can, but so can any other system, as basically technology and education are what causes development.

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

There is absolute and relative poverty. In absolute terms, yes ofcourse, people are better off than in 1850. But that's not really interesting. It's necessary for Capitalism to work that there is a market. So, you give people a bit extra wages every year, so they can buy products on the market. Without that, Capitalism stops in its tracks. The more interesting question is the relative one. That talks about the difference what the capitalists get and what the workers get. That gap actually keeps increasing and has for the last 40 years. Ofc I'm not talking about individual companies, but the class on the whole. We have seen enormous technical advancements, but the workers have not benefitted at all

[@alanfike]

I appreciate your neutrality with this explanation, and feel that I have a clearer understanding now.

[@willumbermarchant5510]

Thank you. That was extremely useful and informative

[@ehzimmer]

Thank you; you just saved me a lot of time.

[@bigpapaT65]

Great work, Ryan. It is a privilege to listen to your analysis and you synthesize into easily digestible portions. E Pluribus Unum

[@vacuumcleaner5208]

This is probably one of the top most underrated Chanels for political commentary out there,

[@kattekongen]

Great stuff again!

[@polit469]

Thank you so much, These Concepts are really nightmare to understand for STEM student. BRAVO!!!

[@SuperGhettoBob]

I wish I could have had watched this when I was in college.

[@googlekonto2851]

To fail a basic course in political philosophy? My god

[@SuperGhettoBob]

@@googlekonto2851 You're talking to a jackass who studied for his exam on Napoleon by watching the movie Waterloo. So, yes, this would have been an improvement over the CliffsNotes version of Marx I read in college.

[@googlekonto2851]

@@SuperGhettoBob American University?

[@SuperGhettoBob]

@@googlekonto2851 Yes

[@Poopmannn]

@@SuperGhettoBob no you still would have failed after watching this

[@yeet9410]

I don't agree that just because only socialists are allowed that the political system is totalitarian. Liberal democracies don't allow fascists, monarchists, and sometimes socialists to have a say in government and in most liberal democracies the only choices are different types of liberalism and we seem to be ok with that. Why does the standard change when a hypothetical socialist country doesn't let capitalists, monarchists, and fascists have a say in government?

[@Ara-wo5ho]

That’s a good point

[@stevekovoc3939]

Pretty much, yes. I think that's generally what Marx was advocating for, here. Of course, I don't care too much about what Marx believes as his works aren't the Bible. However, I recognize he had a lot of valuable things to say. I'd imagine that, in the modern world, socialism would come about through unionization, then those unionized workplaces to become worker coops, and so on and so on. And the "disallowing non-socialist parties to run" thing would be, at worst, much like, as you said, like how modern liberal democracies don't allow for fascists or monarchists to gain power (Germany comes to mind immediately with them not allowing Nazi parties in their nation), as well as the fact that those ideas would eventually be viewed as despicable by the general populace, much like how monarchism is today in the US, for example. Also keep in mind that democracy, when it first came about, was not exactly popular amongst the average person, as most people were monarchist back then. My general beliefs in regards to what socialism would (generally) look like is the workers control the means of production, as in they decide what generally happens in the workplace, and they elect their bosses and whatnot. Think of it like democracy in the workplace, putting it simply. I would see this occurring over time after unionization becomes extremely common, and once it becomes common, eventually strikes force these corporations to become worker coops, and so on and so forth, more or less. Again, I'm very much simplifying everything, but believe me when I say there are a TON of resources to explain what I mean. I would recommend looking into various theory books in regards to these ideologies (which you can find online, like the Anarchist Library, or Marxists.org, etc.), but I would also look at various KZbin videos briefly explaining these ideologies from various socialists online to get a better idea.

[@ophanimangel3143]

Well in present Germany, there are existing fascist leaning parties, even as they are dog leashed to an extent.

[@episteme_]

Thanks! Very Informative. On a side note, what's that software/tool that you are using for streaming the books and the highlight feature within it for illustration?

[@maxsweetman6341]

Thanks Ryan that was so interesting

[@TrampMachine]

I mean as it is now we don't have a multi-party democracy. On top of that we have oligarchy, a system where politicians are openly bought by the rich and where political action corresponds almost not at all with public opinion.

[@jacobroloff3504]

Do you mean to imply that totalitarianism is inevitable, so we might as well have “good” totalitarianism?

[@dominicgunderson]

@@jacobroloff3504 Marx wasn't for or against totalitarianism, so I'm not sure what you're on about. Ideally, he'd like for the revolution to be non-violent.

[@jacobroloff3504]

@@dominicgunderson I didn’t even mention Marx, I’m talking about you. Wether the violence is explicit in a revolution or implicit in the enforcement of the policies of the new regime is immaterial, and in any case I never mentioned violence, nor do I deny it’s necessity as an order-keeping mechanism in every human society. Your comment seems to imply that we don’t have a choice about the totality of our affairs now, so we might as well have an an order that is “social” or “serves the people” instead of the owner class, in some way. Which of course is the stated rationale of any modern regime anyway

[@dominicgunderson]

@@jacobroloff3504 I'm not OP but that wouldn't be totalitarianism.

[@jacobroloff3504]

@@dominicgunderson OP is talking about how the current order is totalitarian, and bad for serving an elite minority rather than the majority of people, and not taking umbrage with the totalitarian methods, but rather the end to those means. The implication being that totalitarianism in and of itself is neutral, and it’s to what ends wether it’s good or bad

[@justinjohnson9456]

I aspire to be as well informed as you are. Im trying my best but especially modern philosophy and politics are dense subjects. Thanks for the breakdowns!

[@Zhicano]

You weren’t informed you were lied to after this video.

[@ryebread3417]

These other replies are correct

[@soulcapitalist6204]

Luckily Marx and marxism are marxist politics and marxist philosophy and marxist economics and marxist sociology - a side show - and can be completely ignored for lacking any redeemable value, whatsoever, to modern politics, philosophy or economics. Just like today, Marx had to compose and present something novel, true and rational to be taken seriously, whereas all marxian economics is recycled from a wastebin of disproven economic theory from 20-50 years prior to his debuting them. Marx is a deliberate parody - demagoguery - of philosophical standards like socratic rationality, political standards like human rights and freedoms and self-government and economic standards like proof and mathematic basis and economies as predictable phenomenon.

[@artbuck7709]

Wow. How very well done. How enlightening.

[@dwiz1847]

Thank you for a concise, back-to-the-original lecture on Marx/Engels and their political/economic philosophy. I eagerly await you applying the same treatment on Adam Smith and the original philosophy of Capitalism. You know... in a dialectic kind way. ;p

[@bookworm8415]

Yes please. A summary of adam smiths economic theory and its french roots would be amazing.

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

He actually misrepresented Marx' dialectics, Ryan put Hegels dialectics one on one on Marx, but Marx had his own version that was different, and more dynamic

[@soulcapitalist6204]

@@raymondhartmeijer9300 Marx's dialectic proposed that it is some natural process and this is clearly bullshit. Dialectic is a contrived way intellectuals may decide between two matters they selected to decide (Hegel). Marx presents the impossible case of natural dialectic (historical or dialectic materialism) and he does this so that he is not personally recognized as the Hegelian idealist driving his claim. It has zero philosophical basis (socratic or hegelian std) - conjecture, and easily debunked (for example, systems of economics have not been swapped out rigidly as proposed in the first place).

[@twilightknight2333]

5:34 there's so much truth in this passage by Marx. The alienated labor is even worse when you know you're being pay a crap wages, work long hours or part time, and have no good medical insurance, etc...

[@joshuahjoseph6738]

I agree and have felt this my whole working life. I disagree with Communism as a solution and the us vs them mentality it fosters. Have you ever looked into an amazing book called Ishmael by Daniel Quinn??

[@johnbuckner2828]

@@joshuahjoseph6738 Is that the one Alex Jones was talking about? On Joe Rogan or Tim pool i think… I’m gonna check it out since you mentioned it. I just KZbin the audiobook it looks like I can listen to it while I drive. kzbin.info/www/bejne/iZPYk62KoNqcd7c

[@joshuahjoseph6738]

@@johnbuckner2828 Yes it is the one mentioned when both Alex Jones and Michael Malice were on Tim Pools podcast. It really bothered me though because both Michael and Alex talked down about Ishmael and completely misrepresented it and compared it wokism. It is not and actually shines a lot of light on the human global/societal problems from a radically new context.

[@joshuahjoseph6738]

@@johnbuckner2828 Also give it time to get into the important conversations. Would love to hear what you think!

[@johnbuckner2828]

@@joshuahjoseph6738 I’ll give it a try, I actually started listening to it right now.

[@mira_shindento]

When you said that eventually, Capitalism survived much longer and people lived much better than Marx predicted, it should be added that this is mostly because capitalists, pressured by their Marxists counterpart in their respective countries + the anxiety of a revolution, and the post-WWII USSR at the doorstep accepted to compromise leading to things such as social security, healthcare, in most European countries for instance.

[@malcolmfreeman1330]

not to mention the reformists and unions changing legislation that benefitted workers - or do you think they accepted those due to the fear/pressure of marxist revolution- like professor Richard Wolf eplains why Roosevelt raised taxes and did new deal to end depression in usa

[@hurtingmurphy]

This video was phenomenal.

[@baqarhasan9743]

This was a great video!

[@hanichaudhry5058]

I will just say, that Marx's actual prediction that wealth will become more concentrated in the hands of the rich, is actually proving true. A lot of economists do actually agree with Marxist economists, but only primarily on his reasoning on why capitalism is bad. Because Marx's predictions are actually holding true, people call this stage (particularly post-2008 financial crash) "late-stage capitalism"

[@Saskobest]

When was it ever distriputed more "evenly"? for thousand of years kings, tribal leaders etc controlled 99% of wealth and power and had small team of trustworthy people around them that had some money also, so in the last 200 years the common man has more wealth than ever

[@DaveMelton]

Absolutely love it! At last I can get raw facts about a subject without getting someone who's trying to convert me with a one sided argument or conversation.

[@SkwisgaarScampini]

@@devilslogic609marxism is evil

[@SkwisgaarScampini]

@@devilslogic609 I change my mind, you’re right

[@SkwisgaarScampini]

@@devilslogic609 I can already tell it is, thank you for convincing me brother

[@SkwisgaarScampini]

@@devilslogic609 🍻

[@soulcapitalist6204]

Especially refreshing that he's not droning on and on about greed like tankie videos.

[@ETl-kd2up]

Thank u for explaining things in simple terms

[@pjaworek6793]

Crystal clear.👍

[@korylester9769]

I feel as though the idea that not having an opposing party that is trying to push an alternative economic system is totalitarian or divorced from democracy, is not a particularly fair take. I’m not sure how many countries have a set up like that. Republicans and Democrats are both capitalist, Tories and Labour are both capitalist. I feel as though this is a particular criticism is one levied at socialist systems but for any society to progress it can’t be debating the basis of its entire economy all the time. Either way thank you for the video and research on a topic a lot of ppl won’t bother to touch

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

The US is de facto a one-party state

[@harryertai4718]

Great content, instant sub

[@thinktankdetective8307]

Hey I really like videos and think it is very informative.

[@souchoysaeteurn5211]

Thank you for the video and for exaplaining things clearly. I personally do not agree with marxism, but I do like learning about his teachings.

[@t00bgazer]

You didnt learn much about marxs teachings here. Instead you were told what to think about a misrepresentation of marxism. Seriously i challenege you to read a couple of marxs works and then watch this again.

[@joejones9520]

@@t00bgazer no one has read marx's works, i promise that you havent either.

[@soulcapitalist6204]

@@t00bgazer Bollocks. This video is pretty well done. You people are the ones without the Marx reading and this is how obvious your propaganda is different from what the man wrote. You probably believe all the propaganda, like that Marx did not call for brutal dictatorship under state capitalism or that marxism is some stateless bullshit or that marx analyzed capitalism/economics.

[@natas12rm]

We didn't experience the increased poverty of the middle class? Wtf? The CEOs of companies make 351 times the wage of a worker. The financial crisis of 1970, 2006, 2022. It may not of all came at once but they have drained the middle class. We have 2,667 billionaires. The middle class went from 61% to 50% from 1970 until now. And that is being generous.

[@lightfeather9953]

Median wages have gone up and up. Pointing at blips on the overall long term trend of steady strong economic growth and calling it a failure is missing the forest by looking at a few dead trees. It's not even an apples to apples comparison to look at Americans of decades ago. Tens of millions of immigrants have moved to the USA and increased their wages a lot by doing so even if many of them are working class. That growing working class size doesn't mean the Americans who were middle class have moved down. You clearly haven't actually taken an honest look at income mobility statistics. There's nothing to suggest that Americans from decades ago are poorer. Household sizes have decreased significantly which affects household income.

[@stenbom]

@@lightfeather9953 Conflating median wages and the purchasing power of the working class is indigenous at best. The purchasing power of the working class has not moved an inch since the early 60s.

[@dissident112]

A lot of this is starting to come true. The middle class is being priced out of the system as "private equity" is being allowed unrestricted to buy up large quantities of assets. Nobody should own 20 houses. Corporations should not own houses. There needs to be laws in place to keep the super rich from gobbling up everything, but there isn't. This will eventually result in resolution and collapse. I don't believe marxism is the answer, but we do need more checks and balances.

[@soulcapitalist6204]

Middle class is less due to poor immigrants being welcomed in different proportions than before. Measuring middle class is not economic/scientific, but rather just leftist populist demagogy of the fact there's a median performance in economies.

[@thespeculum785]

You think the middle class today is less materially prosperous than the middle class in the 1800’s? Lol

[@TubeDude]

I would enjoy essays that examine the primary internal contradictions and internally caused break-downs within all of the political and social systems you have covered.

[@soulcapitalist6204]

Contradiction hunting is poor quality of philosophy and one of the reasons why marxist philosophy is only indulged in by marxists and never used in sincere analysis of any topic. For example, the approach to these same matters of contradictions and critique in conventional economics is the recognition and redress of externalities (Pigou). Rather than the marxist approach which ignorantly assumes systems are or have been swapped out in a quest for fewer contradictions, or worst yet, that these have materialized as a result of broad economic experience (historical materialism), the economic scholars of the time had not recognized any dialectic of economic systems for 20 some years. In that 20 years passed before Marx's graduation, socialism was buried by capitalism on the same grounds of competency and human rights as present day (Ricardo vs Malthus). In that same time, the philosophical approach and certainly Marx's sophist approach were completely deprecated from economics because these methods are estranged from reality, rather than informed and constrained by reality (science).

[@wonderland2016]

like the way to discuss things, keep up your good work. looking forward to watching more your videos.

[@Independent97]

Ryan Chapman should have a discussion with Dr. Richard Wolff

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

well, the problem is that Wolff is not Orthodox Marxist. He takes from Marxism what is relevant today. That's why he emphasising workers self-management, which is more Libertarian-socialist, and not 'state power' to run the economy. So this whole talk of state control over everything is really a product of the times in which Marx lived, where there was still slavery, serfdom, and only a small elite could even vote and work in politics

[@soulcapitalist6204]

​@@raymondhartmeijer9300 Wolff can't escape state autocracy. He just avoids commentary on it, being more passive with his aggression than Marx. For example, he is no innovator as to worker cooperative modes, he aims for the state to force businesses to operate in a unilateral worker coop mode of production which is based on idealism of Marx - that is Marx's suggested approach - versus the materialism of citizens - ie the liberal democracy which capitalist modes are universally based on.

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

@@soulcapitalist6204 I don’t see why that same liberal democracy couldn’t choose to make changes to the economic system, the aim is to increase democracy, by introducing it to the workplace, not first abolish democracy. For example, West- Germany introduced in 1976 a law that said half the board of directors of a company of 1000+ employees should be voted in by the workers. This can be seen as a step towards a more democratic economic system. Nowhere is it carved in stone that Socialism should be “ exactly like the USSR was” Socialist parties make their analysis on the basis of what is relevant today and see what policies can improve society

[@soulcapitalist6204]

@@raymondhartmeijer9300 We're not talking about referendum governments. We are discussing political ideologues who aim to force heterodox applications of democracy which are authoritarian. Democracy is not virtuous. Liberal democracy - democracy with the freedom of self determination through limits on state determination - is a virtue. Democracy without these limits as proposed by socialists is authoritarian. It is majority mandate. In rep democracies like Germany, it is 1 or 2 people making such a law, not public mandate at all. When I say Wolff can't escape the authoritarianism, but simply does not discuss it, you and these modern socialists are in the same spot. You propose an unethical role of state and Germany's legislation is no exception to that. It's a shade of gleichschaltung by the gleichschalters. Should I be impressed?

[@raymondhartmeijer9300]

@@soulcapitalist6204 it is mandated, as it has to pass a majority in parliament, which is directly voted in by the people as highest political body. I’m not suggesting abolishing that, no. You may call certain policies that go through parliament ‘authoritarian’ , I simply call it the organisation of society. And I don’t think Germany is such a bad country to live in. A society has to be organised, or it will fall into chaos and randomness, which wouldn’t serve people’s basic rights or opportunities in life

[@rickymetz869]

I liked the easily digestible breakdown of Marx early on. I disagree that you've really found anything in Marx that supports totalitarianism though. As you say, he was openly pro-democracy, pro-freedom of speech etc. The passages you quote are mostly about revolution, which Marx was obviously OK with. A logical conclusion from your argument is that all revolutions are totalitarian - including revolutions that have instituted liberal regimes. The rest of the claims - state-owned media, no freedom of speech etc, aren't accompanied by quotes like your earlier arguments - and that's because they simply don't reflect anything Marx said.

[@hEmZoRz]

Exactly my thoughts. And the same thing seems to repeat in most of Ryan's videos: for the most part of the video (typically beginning), he's genuinely unbiased, breaking down the concepts neutrally and objectively, and thereby building trust vith the viewer - but at some point, the stance changes radically. I wouldn't necessarily consider this problematic (obviously it's ok to have a political stance) if only he was open about it and didn't veil the biased message behind seemingly objective rethoric. Now, especially the viewers less educated on the topic probably think that they base their recently gained understanding on neutral information, but in actuality end up seeing the subject through a biased lens. And once again, nothing wrong with seeing a subject through a biased lens, unless you don't understand it yourself. On a broader level, this is my issue with centrisism (though I don't know whether Ryan considers himself a centrist): it tries to disguise the inherent and inevitable politicalness of any political topic, all the while having a clear bias to one way or another (typically to the right), thereby easily misleading people.

[@billmaster1157]

“Socialised man (Public sector), the associated producers (Workers), rationally regulating their interchange with nature (Controlling the market and not letting it be free), bringing it under their common control (Bringing it into the hierarchy of public state control), instead of being ruled by it as by blind forces of nature (instead of being ruled by the free market or private market, Capitalism)." - Karl Marx The public sector state, in the name of the workers, is controlling the market, not letting it be free, by bringing all of society into the hierarchy of the public state: the government. What Marx is saying is he wants a state monopoly on property, media, transport, factories and production centres, a central state bank with a monopoly, state monopoly on education and agriculture and so on. If the state owns all property and production, they can say and do anything they please with the premise "uh it belongs to men and my say goes, you can just back off." What comes next is this, Marx and Engels say that once this is complete, the state will just die away. But here’s the problem, the private sector always exists, all states and governments are built on top of it. So when the central state supposedly disappears you’re left with a private sector without a state; we call this anarcho-capitalism. So Marx and Engels are either secretly anarcho-capitalists or they are lying about the state dissolving into non existence. So yes he is saying it, just vaguely. You have to read between the lines and read into the words they use.

[@realryanchapman]

Just seeing this comment and it seems worth responding to. Marx was pro democracy in the same way Mao was pro democracy. They both said it here and there, but it doesn't mean anything held up against their actual policies. They imagined that those policies represented the will of most people, but didn't require it. And that doesn't capture the essence of democracy anyway, since democracy means sharing political power across all of society (the idea that everyone gets a voice). Being pro democracy means having an appreciation for political pluralism, since not everyone thinks the same way. That appreciation for political pluralism is not in Marx's writing, rather it's filled with the opposite: hostility towards ideas that don't match his. Rather than calling for pluralism, Marx and Engels called for the 'dictatorship of the proletariat,' brought on by the 'overthrow of bourgeois supremacy, (and the) conquest of political power by the proletariat' (from the Communist Manifesto). From there the proletariat would rule and implement communist principles, which I went over in the video. There isn't an emphasis on protecting anyone's speech that disagrees with those principles (protecting unpopular speech doesn't just happen. It needs to be emphasized as a foundational necessity in order to achieve it). There are even hints to the opposite effect. Marx and Engels talked about seizing the property of rebels (from the Manifesto) and putting down political opposition via the power of the state (in a letter by Engels). These are the ingredients for a totalitarian society. They don't say it outright, just as they don't outright say they're against free speech (who does?) but the writing is on the wall. In my opinion it's irresponsible to cover Marx without spelling that out. I try to cover these topics fairly, which means highlighting aspects of Marx that Marxists will appreciate (the first part of this video apparently for many), and also highlight aspects of Marx that people against Marx will appreciate (the second half for many). If you expect a content creator to make you comfortable when watching controversial content like this then you're probably expecting that creator to have a bias in your favor.

[@dukeofmonmouth1956]

@@realryanchapman Incorrect, leftists then and now still argue what democracy means? Workers councils, Democratic Centralism, sortition or socialist parliamentarianism. Marx was pro workers councils while mao was pro Democratic centralism/one party state. So your first point is incorrect. Critique of the Gotha programs best sums up Marxist beliefs on the “state” and economy. Also Liberal regimes are not democratic. Democracy is fundamentally the rule of the poor/majority. Montesquieu, Locke, Socrates, Hayek, Marx, our founding fathers, and modern Neoliberal thinkers believed liberalism and Democracy are incompatible. Liberal regimes are very statist and use state organs such as a strong military, police state, surveillance state, and a judicial branch to protect property rights. No where in the constitution is the word democracy mentioned. Democracy as all of the classical and modern liberal philosophers believed it to be, is only achieved through sortition, public elections, direct votes on issues and workers councils. Republics on the other hand are oligarchies where rule of the minority reigns supreme. So why are you and many other socialliberals calling modern Neoliberal Republics “democracies” ? Simple during the 1860s Jean Baptista von Schweitzer was the first to start this trend. His belief on what democracy is summed up that a workers party will take power through elections and will represent the interests of the people. Later Lenin in the east along with the Democratic Party(USA) and social democratic parties of Europe began using this definition. During ww2 and the cold war both sides used the word democracy to define their governments in order to feel like they have the moral high ground. And now this definition of democracy is still used to this day. Both the Republican and Democratic parties of the USA claim to have the interests of the “American working class” or “middle class”. But we all know that they’re parties that support finance capital or industrial capital. Incredible how 19th century social-democratic theory influenced Lenin, the labour parties, American politics, and modern social liberal thinking. And no, having to spend 2.4 million dollars for a seat on the House of Reps or 15.7 million dollars for a seat in the senate does not make your country a democracy. Rather a functioning oligarchy. However one could argue that Alexis de Tocqueville inspired this wave of New-democracy with his beliefs on tyrannical -democracy. But modern day use of democracy uses many social-democratic elements to describe their causes.

[@marcy5269]

@@dukeofmonmouth1956 wow dude this actually made so much sense and you were able to put into words what ive always thought of our government and how people use democracy in our politics.