Stephen Kotkin explains the real reason Marxism keeps attracting intellectuals and young people, even after the body count. It is not because the theory works. It is because it offers something far more seductive: total, rapid transformation and a special role for the intellectual class. In a market system,... ordinary people make their own decisions. Under Marxism-Leninism, the intellectuals get to make the decisions for everyone. They become the engineers of society. Workers and peasants are treated as people with “false consciousness” who need to be led. The ideology flatters the people who believe they are smarter than the rest of society. That is why the blood does not put them off. The power is worth the cost.show more

Would this apply to Marxists?

Marxism remains attractive because it makes a complex society appear morally and mechanically simple: identify the oppressor, transfer control, engineer equality. It is elegant, assuming honest administrators, complete information, aligned incentives and power that never corrupts. No production system would be approved on assumptions that fragile. The flaw is not compassion. It is believing that millions of people and their choices can be engineered from the top.

If you listen carefully to Marxists argue, you’ll notice most of them are envisioning a future where THEY are the central planner.

when critics of Communism say that “they killed 9M people” (or whatever number it is) kids assume that that was “other people” - as in they killed others during war etc. The phrasing has to be more precise: “Communist governments killed 9M of their own people. Communists caused people in their own countries to die. People like you and me. If you elect a communist, expect to be a statistic.”

Young kids and older kids, and plenty of adults love the quick fix. Christianity is not taught enough, that opens a window to an amazingly transformational world for people, who must go through TRIALS and SETBACK, and DIFFICULTIES. Once refined, people are productive; better 🙏🏼

He is so close to it. "Delusional Utopia" is what the left is selling Every argument they put forth is from an unobtainable position that has never happened and has no possibility of happening.

The big lie that they believe is that the blood will never belong to them. But because most have never actually studied, just navel-gazed for decades and wrote about it in academic patois, they don’t know that they are usually the second to be forced to turn and face the wall, unless they are true psychopaths, which, unfortunately, we can’t rule out strictly on the basis of the “work” they produce.

I disagree that Marxism attracts intellectuals. It attracts stupid people who think they are intelligent. The retarded and lazy

This is completely true. But fewer and fewer normal people are fooled, so there's that.

Islam too promises a simple solution to all of the world's perceived evils. And violence to enact that solution is not just justified, but demanded as a righteous war, martyrs of which are guaranteed the highest heaven.

They don't understand they'll be the first ones lined up against a wall and shot, or put to hard labor, because they've proven they're agitators and resistors. Once the ruling class takes over, they're not needed anymore and will only cause problems.

Also, "even after the body count," TBH, revolution is attractive for people who like the idea of murder and torture for people who they suspect of having a nicer life than them.

I’m still working my way through Giles Udy’s magnificent “Labour and the Gulag”. Currently reading about Stalin’s 19/9 purges of the Kulak’s. Utterly horrific, so much so that his own wife committed suicide in anguish over his actions. More like 20million of his own people sent to death camps, shot or disappeared over a few years. How can people even contemplate any merits to this kind of behaviour?

All of the changes that they are going to try to enact socialism through can be addressed through the law. Mamdani is going to try and put every grocery store and bodega out of business. That's a civil suit imo

Socialism combines the two worsts sins: Pride and Envy. Pride, because they see themselves as white knights with lofty ideals, ignoring how they are dragging everyone down. Envy, because they take from others and have no qualms serving themselves when so doing. Socialism is just a name people use to avoid having to answer to the millions of deaths communism caused.

It’s more than that. Marxists have a specific, focused form of mental retardation that renders them incapable of understanding dynamic phenomena. Their inability to grasp the Laffer Curve is a demonstration of this. Smarter people immediately understand that the Laffer Curve is a dynamic phenomenon that unfolds consequently over time. Marxists do not. Probably the mental defect is clinically measurable by psychological professionals like @jordanbpeterson .

They're both lazy; they do not want to do any physical work. Intellectuals think they should get paid just because they're smart. No physical labor: I know stuff, pay me. Young people are spoiled children who received everything as a child and now have to go out and earn an income and hate it.

It's a power play - it always has been. Concern for the working poor is just a tactic. Orwell described this beautifully. Same with open borders - concern for the migrants is again just a tactic - something to beat the right around the head with. In reality, the misery caused to the poor in the West from increased poverty and dependency, as well as suffering from trafficked vulnerable people around the world is greatly increased. So someone mediocre like Maduro can be King of an impoverished failed state, or some pally Labour PM in the UK rule over trash strewn streets, vape shops and dodgy barbers.

“Some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals will believe them.”

💯 ⬆️power trip + Marxism provides salvation for the atheists and secular (fills spiritual gap in socialist lives). Nozick's explanation is still one of the most insightful: In his 1998 essay, "Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?", libertarian philosopher Robert Nozick offers a psychological and sociological explanation for why "wordsmith intellectuals" (academics, writers, journalists, and philosophers) disproportionately favor left-leaning ideologies like socialism over free-market capitalism. Rather than focusing on ideological arguments, Nozick grounds his analysis in the way intellectuals develop their sense of self-worth and entitlement throughout their formative years: The School System as a Micro-Society: Nozick argues that intellectuals spend their formative years in formal schooling, an environment where "verbally bright" individuals are consistently placed at the top of the social and institutional hierarchy. They receive praise, high grades, and recognition based on intellectual merit. Expectation of Entitlement: Because they are conditioned in an environment where intelligence and verbal skill command the highest status and rewards, intellectuals internalize the belief that society *should* be structured to reward people in accordance with this specific kind of merit. The Reality of the Capitalist Market: Upon entering the broader capitalist economy, intellectuals discover that the market operates on a completely different principle. Capitalism rewards individuals based on how effectively they satisfy consumer demand, not on academic brilliance or verbal intelligence. As a result, entrepreneurs, business owners, and entertainers often earn significantly more wealth and prestige than intellectuals. Resentment and Animus: This disparity produces a feeling of unrecognized superiority and betrayed entitlement. Intellectuals view the market’s distribution of status as inherently unfair because it fails to grant them the top position they believe they deserve. Attraction to Planned Systems (Socialism): Because intellectuals want society to function like a "school writ large"—a centralized system where reward is distributed according to explicit, central principles of merit—they are naturally drawn to socialism and central planning. Socialism promises a system where centralized authority allocates value and resources, restoring intellectuals to a position of status and social planning. Ultimately, Nozick concludes that intellectual opposition to capitalism is driven less by economic theory and more by a sense of status anxiety and resentment toward a system that does not honor their self-perceived superiority.

Well first off, Marxism is completely disconnected from reality, which means it'll be attractive to people who expertise isn't grounded in facts Artists, journalists, and professors don't pay the same price economists, engineers, and doctors do for disobeying reality

It has been my experience that the "intellectual class" are among the first to be put against the wall. Suckers. 😖

God complex. And a contempt for the masses. And an exaggerated worth of their intellect. Truly, 99% of philosophical and sociological type outputs is not only valueless, it is actively harmful.

Collectivism, of all sorts, especially socialism, is rooted in envy and arrogance. Those will always be with us, and that's why socialism keeps popping up over and over, no matter how many times it crashes. It is the consequence of the worst and weakest in human nature.

You people are either really brainwashed and naive. Or you’re just being gaslighting fascists fucks. I don’t know anyone that subscribes to an actual Marxist ideology! There hasn’t even been a place that’s truly Marxist in decades! You motherfuckers so dishonest about reality it’s pathetic! What you’re doing right now is a huge example of why younger people are not fans of capitalism. Not to mention the fact that you’re actions and what you actually support. Are so fucking hypocritical it’s nauseating! Capitalism is an evil thing as it progresses as well. There’s a difference in free, fair and transparent commerce. And capitalism. A very simplistic illustration is the board game, Monopoly. First, we can start with just the words and their definitions. Capitalism is the acquiring of as much of it as you can possibly get. How you do it, who you fuck over And what the consequences are for everyone else. Are not even a thought. To try and say some lying bullshit like there’s free and fair trade. Transparency of the market let supplying demand determine the market. It’s fucking insulting to try and make people believe that. The market is manipulated and controlled and has been for fucking ever. The object of the game Monopoly is to acquire everything there. Then everybody lives under your thumb. You get to go by one set of rules and they go by another one. And you make sure that they never acquire anything else that they are beholden to you from that point forward. And they will do whatever they can to keep you in that lowly position. That is already been maxed out and illustrated once before. It’s why antitrust laws had to be enacted. Don’t get me wrong. Capitalism can have some pluses about it. But the more it progresses the worse it gets. And when it’s to the point that it is with us right now. It is fucking evil. The vast majority of the population wind up like rats on a fucking wheel. That are made to work for as little as possible. While the prices are always kept just a little bit higher than anything they could afford. Keeping them in a state of constant debt that they will never get out of. Everything is manipulated to work that way. And they go by a different set of rules and everyone else. They literally get away with fucking murder. This bullshit of you can start a business and be anything you wanna be in. The sky is the limit. That is such a crock of fucking shit! They buy the politicians they make the laws they make the rules. And they do it to keep everybody as economic, fucking slaves and cannon fodder! In order for Capital listen to progress. There needs to be a certain type of financial framework. A debt based central bank fractional, reserve, creation of Capital/Fiat. That pretty much has to exist for capitalism to work! A system that has been tried thousands of times over millennia. That has a 100% failure rate. That immediately says capitalism is going to be fucked up at some point. It is not a good thing for the vast majority of the people in the end. By definition, it cannot be. So you people keep on with your delusional bullshit all you want to. But know that it is delusional bullshit. And that is why especially the younger generations are not real fucking hot on it. It’s more of a feudal system. And as it progresses. It gets worse and worse for at least 90% of the population. You have to be in denial not to see what is happening right now. Hypocritical evil fucks! Trump is making billion dollar companies partner with the government and have an equity stake! Anybody wanna tell me what that is by definition? He is centralizing Power. Fuck the checks and balances. Centralized power! You motherfuckers support the most Marxist shit that’s ever happened in this country right now! Billion $$ companies making yr on yr record profit. Are given trillions of dollars in taxpayer money. The most grotesque display of socialism in this nation HYPOCRITICAL FUCKS!

It’s much simpler and arises at an earlier age. The college education simply reinforces it. The ideology arises out of the Liberal family structure (or lack thereof) where parenting is a Socialist operation, children are the “intellectual” class, and they’re instructed (indoctrinated) into the Socialist ideals by the parents. Parenting, in general, is a Socialist construct in a microcosm, so it’s no surprise that children grow up wanting the system to expand across society.

Bernie wants to make the decisions for everyone, but he ain’t no intellectual.😜 And the Mamdani’s now running NYCity sound like they don’t have the brain capacity of a banana. Then we have Hong. 😜😜

The problem is that the intellectual class is the first to go under the newly formed Marxist system. They are always rounded up and killed or sent to the gulags because they know too much and cause problems for the very few who end up in power.

Whether Mamdani would imprison and kill millions of people if he were President is unclear. If I were Jewish I would be worried.

So what your saying is that intellectuals can't really do anything except bring horror to the world.

@mr_james_c Most ideologies on the extreme promise exactly this and is why those ideologies cause immense damage.

It is no longer marxism, really-- it is gay race communism, not classic class marxism. THus, they can legitimately distance themselves from Russia and China. Do they try to distance themselves? I don't know.