Seems to me that this is too heavy on the “Marxism” side and too light on the “Leninism”. There’s a lot of really good texts on theory and developing a Marxist understanding of the world, but very little regarding party work and praxis.

Foundations of Leninism is a certified chonker but it’s pulling all the weight there in the Leninism section (which should rightfully be the biggest), whereas WitbD is a really messy read without context and frankly Roderic Day’s text is extremely lacking by portraying Lenin, in his words, as “a world-class observer and theoretician” rather than a dedicated party builder. I’d replace that one with something else that focuses on Lenin’s practice instead of his analytical abilities. Lenin’s too often reduced to just “writer of the Imperialism book”, and I think this inclusion here does his theory a disservice. It’s also so short that even Existential Comics twitter thread would be a decent drop-in replacement, but there’s probably some better short biography out there.

On that note, I actually think a biographical summary is the wrong start here, as Leninism is not the study of Lenin the human. It’d be more useful to add “Where to Begin?” as it serves as a fine preamble to WitbD, and really drives home the necessity of (some form of) a Party Newspaper, something that is ignored by many MLs today. Even then, readers might come out without even knowing the names of key concepts such as “Democratic Centralism” as the old texts use different names.

I’m not sure what would be good inclusions here. Huey’s “The Correct Handling of a Revolution”, maybe? I see that in the advanced study guide you have included texts from Liu Shaoqi, which I haven’t read so can’t opine much, but maybe one of those could be included here? Besides that the best I can offer is Mao’s “Rectify the Party’s Style of Work” and “On the Correct Handling” as shorter texts exemplifying Leninism.

I think this section is critical enough that making it bigger wouldn’t amount to bloat. Specially since a lot of leftists fall into the orthodox Marxist trap of knowing a lot, except for the knowledge of how to actually do something. There’s also a genuine lack of post-Third-International texts in English on the topic, so compiling them would be rather useful.

On that note, on cultural hegemony. I’m quite biased due to heavily disagreeing with him lately, but I’d just scrap Jones Manoel there and replace him with something from his actual sources. His video essays naturally end up being very verbose while saying very little, which is fine for daily youtube videos but not for theory learning. And this is not even close to being his best video essay, so I don’t understand why it got picked up so hard by the Anglosphere. I’d go with Losurdo’s “Flight From History” or even “Western Marxism” if length is not an issue. “La Sinistra Assente” (“The Absent Left”) would actually be perfect here, but I only realised now by trying to find the English name that it has only been translated to Spanish and Portuguese, but never English.

Now the minor nitpicks.

Section 4’s checkpoint question on “level of development” makes little sense today without an understanding of imperialism and/or combined and uneven development, which is a section that would only be read afterwards. In those texts (and in general) Marx wrote about industrialising European countries which followed primitive accumulation, but today for most countries the trajectory is different due to the uneven development of imperialism.

In section 2, I’d swap the order of Biographical Sketch and Three Sources, as they deal with the same subject and the latter is much shorter and summarised. Three Sources serves as a neat introduction, but if one read and understood the entirety of Biographical Sketch beforehand it won’t add much.

I feel like Part I of Capital Vol. I should be in either this or the advanced guide. It’s self-contained enough to be read by itself, lays out the fundamentals really well and I don’t think Inferno does a good enough job of summarising it considering the reader is already going through other complex texts through these guides.

Section 5’s first checkpoint question opens the can of worms of “Socialism in One Country” that I think would be counterproductive given the texts in question are only from before the Soviet Revolution.

I actually sat down to read redsails’s MER in order to give credence to my kneejerk rejection of it, but it surprised me by getting me to agree with most its claims. From the way I’ve seen people talk about it, I always assumed it was some typical first-world defeatist essay about how even the most lumpen of proletariat in the imperial core is metaphysically counter-revolutionary due to some supposed personal benefit from imperialism and settlerism. Instead it’s a pretty fair critique of the elitism of “free thinking rebels” who see themselves above the “brainwashed masses”. It’s right there in the title, damn it! I think the checkpoint question about it could be more leading in pointing away from first-world defeatism, but in reality I really just wanted to comment on how you really shouldn’t judge a book by its cover lol.

And lastly, it feels odd that the Social-Liberation section has nothing from the BPP.

want to help create a world where those who see no other option besides death can be told to live in earnest.

I think ML thought is the best possible method that has been tried, at least so far, in historical attempts, to create such a world.

Our current society doesn’t make any sense. For instance: Health minister telling doctors that they will have to put up with patients dying in line, while our city is allocating budget things nobody asks for. Even protesting against.

A socialist society would make the world more lively for everyone, by addressing roto causes.

I believe the way to Marxism was paved by the advancement of our means of production. The industrial revolution. Feudalism was replaced by Capitalism, Marx, himself a student of Dialectics, studied capitalism using dialectical approach, he noticed underlying contradictions in Capitalism, his taught became popular as the contradictions started materializing in everyday lives, of workers.

Social components - How stuff relate to one another Economic components - How is the stuff managed Ideological components - How our means of producing stuff influences the stuff we believe in.

I would belong in the Lumpenproletariat. The people dictating the society would be the Bourgeoise.

An ideologue explains that there’s a group of dangerous people out there. For instance, based on how they speak. A materialist explanation would seek the cause for why the group is behaving the way they are. Perhaps the group aren’t allowed to grow their own food and have to either perish or resort to violence, perhaps it’s because the lack education and don’t know any better.

I can’t think of any. Which is a problem and idk how I can resolve it.

Dialectical materialism: Simple use cause would be to not be guided by my emotions, instead seek to be grounded, reasonable, evaluate the situation around me and do the opposite of what my heart tells me to. Am I scared? I should aim to be brave. Am I lonely? I should aim for a community.

Historical materialism: Learning the history of the people’s around me can help find the cause for why things are the way they are. What historical developments contributed to the way current existence is ordered. Why does one group hate another?

If you don’t want to resolve the class struggles you could guard your vault with violence, give out borrowed life to plant it where it’s absence is causing havoc, put on a theater to distract your victims.

It’s Mixed. We have socialism in the walls and capitalism in the sheets, at odds with one another. F.ex

The state must learn to wither away on it’s own, when global relations make it possible.

Solar-Punk, Anarcho-Primitivists, Liberalism(?)

A socialist country is a country that never lets profit trump over people, where even if such an action is necessary, it is only temporary and able to self-correct.

Empire’s decay makes the reach of their tentacles weaker, enabling the raise of Socialist movements in places such as Sahel.

Because Capitalism within the Empire is unsustainable without Imperialism, if Imperialism went away it would implode and destroy itself. If we understand how it functions, we can help fight against it. Therefore fighting against Capitalism.

I’m the core, the Baltic States. It means I’m on a tight leash, but I also benefit from the spoils of the empire. It’s important to keep that in mind, find way to develop force and assist the causes in the periphery however possible. Strategically.

Find each other and organize. Build productive forces.

In a case like Cuba Nationalism has been progressive.

No

By building alternative forces of production, using those forces to spread counter-hegemonic ideals. Like opening a news station that broadcasts alternative view points targeted at dissatisfied citizens, looking for a solution.

We can’t just fight ideology with ideology, socialism needs more than ideals. There is no secret 3rd way.

Subclasses are those who are stuck between two (or more) opposing class interests. Take a member of the Shadow Class as some may call it.

On one hand they’re people who experience the horrors of our world and are most easily propelled into action.

On the other hand, they could be bought the most easily and stab you in the back.

Because if you don’t you’ll fall into reactionary taught. To put it simply, Whiteness is Whiteness, Bourgeoise Whiteness is not Whiteness, Transness is not Whiteness, but you could be Bourgeoise x White x Trans or Proletarian x White x Trans or Bourgeoise x Non-White x Trans and so on.

Capitalism creates bigotry to prolong itself and prevent the resolution of contradictions. If you are doing identity battles you are not fighting capitalism. You are fighting for Capitalism.

Marginalized groups are part of the most radical elements of society. If they are not co-opted by organizations, then someone else will or they’ll be a force of Chaos, more than likely which will be taken advantage of by the class conscious Bourgeoise.