To preface this post, I consider myself a Marxist, but I am not a communist. I believe that Marx's philosophy is correct and valid, but I disagree with the political solution to the problems he identified.
For those of you unaware what Marxism is, I highly recommend you go and read The Manifesto of the Communist Party[/ir]. It is a very quick read (less than 100 pages), but covers most of Marx's theories as an overview.
Marx's economic and political theories were expanded upon greatly in his other works; most notably [i]Capital (which I have read Vol. 1 of), The German Ideology, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, and many other written works.
To start off this discussion, I have a few questions for the community:
- Do you believe that Marx's views on the class dichotomy are valid, or reductionist? Some modern authors have claimed that Marx downplayed the role of intersectionality in oppression, but Marx himself wrote about gender roles etc often, including in the Manifesto.
- Is Marxism—Leninism revisionist, or is it merely an extension of Marx's views?
- Do you believe that Marx has been vindicated or damned by the more than 170 years since he began to publish his theories?