Reddit mentions of Marx for Beginners

Here are a few suggestions:

• Understand marx. wiki,a helpful podcast, an illustrated guide
  
  
• Understand Freud. wiki
  
  
• Understand Lacan. wiki, fantastic podcast on lacan
  
  Finally, here is a good video overview on some of Z's thought: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUjHUtQ_GQY

I'm glad you asked! This Che manga was absolutely hilarious to read. Really goofy stuff.

This comic about Lenin was pretty cool too, though it was a lot more educational than the last one. There's also one on Marx by the same publishing company.

I'm a sociology graduate and former social science teacher and lecturer, I don't think I need to read introductory books on Marxism, thanks all the same. This was always my favourite actually, it's almost 30 years since I read it! (Not that edition though)

Marx for Beginners and Lenin for Beginners are decent books.

Trường Chinh's August Revolution and The Resistance Will Win are amazing.

Marx For Beginners is the closest thing I can think of that's already out there.

Gonick also has a History of The U.S., by the way.

Van Lente and Dunlavey's Action Philosophers is also a candidate if you're into the history of philosophy. In fact, while I'm at it, let me recommend the "For beginners" series about different philosophers and philosophic traditions. Examples: Marx, Freud, Existensialism etc. For a preview of the series, check out Philosophy for beginners at Google Books.

Edit: They even have reddit favourite Noam Chomsky for beginners!

There's also Rius' Marx for Beginners It's cute and non-confrontational, it's also relatively simple to understand to the uninitiated, and of course it's funny as heck x3

You could also get them some Smurfs comic books xD

> That's called capitalism. The owners of each firm are capitalists - they are investing their capital in order to maximize their profits.

One of the central tenets of any type of socialism --and I'd argue that its the primary one-- is worker control of the means of production, whether this is via the state, worker cooperatives, trade unions or in common by all of society. Whether this is done is a market economy or not is irrelevant to calling it socialism.

"The market" is just a mechanism, and neither intrinsically socialist nor capitalist. Socialism and capitalism primarily ask the question: "WHO owns the means of production?" That's it.

> Imagine a factory in your scenario that produces dialysis machines. Since they are a for-profit firm, and earn profits on each machine they sell, they will only provide their machines to sick and dying people who have the money to pay up.
According to you, this is "socialism".

Except in my scenario, the state would provide universal healthcare (including dialysis machines, catheters, medical butt plugs, etc) to all its citizens, making your point moot.

> Everyone is a worker. If the workers never truly cared about profits, how do you explain the widespread existence of capitalism?

I really hate to putting things this bluntly, but from what you're telling me, you know absolutely jack about socialism. Think I'm wrong? You currently have NO positive comment karma in this entire thread. Why is that? Hell, you've even managed to go below the comment threshold.

Prove to me that, under capitalism, workers generally care how much profit the company pulls in. Workers care about keeping their jobs, their benefits, and getting regular raises. Beyond that, why should they care?

Capitalism's "widespread existence" is attributed to many factors, including capitalism's intrinsic greed and need for a workforce, workers' need to not starve to death, the base's influence on the superstructure and the superstructure's subsequent influence on the base, etc.

> Then why do so many people buy lottery tickets, or spend years getting an education in order to earn more money?

Jesus. Because in modern society, especially in America, only wealth can bring a dignified existence (which I define to mean an existence in which one has their needs met to the point where one is free to maximize their personal potential). There are few good social safety nets, and so in order to not live like a glorified rat, a large income is required. Under socialism, workers would own the means of production and get a larger slice of the pie, larger benefits, a large safety net, etc (under a market economy) or have all of their needs met under a non-profit, "use-value" economy (under "regular" socialism).

> Unbelievable. How the hell can you possibly believe that what you are describing has anything whatsoever to do with socialism.

I can possibly believe that what I am describing has anything to do with socialism because I've actually read about socialism! (I especially like the selective editing, in which you declined to include my explanation that goes much more in-depth than just "Let's hope so".)

You, on the other hand, sound like you haven't read anything on the topic short of some Rage Against the Machine lyrics. That being said, here's some recommended introductory texts:

Marx for Beginners -- an excellent book that does a great job of distilling Marx's philosophical, economic, and revolutionary aspects into an easy-to-digest format.

Socialism

Types of socialism

Market Socialism

Socialist Economics

I sincerely and genuinely hope that you'll check out the above links. You're a bit confused about some of the definitions, and educating yourself a bit more on the topic can only benefit you.

there's actually a very good (and short) comic out there called Marx for Beginners which is a real basic intro to the philosophical and historical origins of Marxism (describing Hegel, and the basic ideas of historical materialism, going into how it shaped Marx's ideas on socialism), I'd recommend it highly for anyone whose just getting into socialist theory.

No, I'm objecting to the fact that we assign the greatest currency value to the labor of those who produce the least use-value.

As for the rest, I'll tell you exactly why it matters.

Take all the imaginary currency out of the equation. Does your CEO have a useful skill that can be applied to the (actual, not financial) benefit of mankind? No? What the fuck is he being paid for, then?

A steamfitter makes a difference in the world, as does a cook, a nurse, a midwife, and a biomedical engineer. All of these people, if financial instruments were to simply cease to exist, have value and add value to the world with their labor.

That is use-value. When your labor actually serves some kind of purpose other than pissing about with money, then you create use-value.

Might I suggest an excellent book, if you would like some real understanding of the topic?