I have been ready Marxist theories since like 18 but it took a long time for me to accept AES. I was the kind of idealists who think “Marxist analysis is absolutely right, but AES is not real socialism because there is no direct workplace democracy”, so I was practically liberal/socdem/anarchist for a long time despite speaking a Marxist language and explaining Marxist critique to people. It really mattered a lot that I eventually went into reading the history of socialist practice, instead of just economic theories and the Eurocentric “critical theory”.
Capitalists love to tie people down with their endless economic theories and jargon. Marxism is so much more, its an entire world view and philosophy, and most capitalist economic theories still makes sense within Marxism, its just about how the state manages that economy, not how economies work.
Chinese-nationalism/pan-Asianism (14-15yo) > Liberalism/Libertarianism (16-19yo) > Social democracy (20-23yo) > Anarcho-Communism (24-25yo) > Marxist-Leninism (26-31/now)
I have been ready Marxist theories since like 18 but it took a long time for me to accept AES. I was the kind of idealists who think “Marxist analysis is absolutely right, but AES is not real socialism because there is no direct workplace democracy”, so I was practically liberal/socdem/anarchist for a long time despite speaking a Marxist language and explaining Marxist critique to people. It really mattered a lot that I eventually went into reading the history of socialist practice, instead of just economic theories and the Eurocentric “critical theory”.
Capitalists love to tie people down with their endless economic theories and jargon. Marxism is so much more, its an entire world view and philosophy, and most capitalist economic theories still makes sense within Marxism, its just about how the state manages that economy, not how economies work.