Patient gamer chiming in. I’ve been playing Cyberpunk 2077 for the first time and loving it. No bugs, a great expansion, and paid $20. For single player games the backlog keeps me a few years behind and the cycle continues.

Right now we live in a dictatorship of the wealthy. The capitalists control productive forces, decide how the majority of us spend our time, and lobby governments in their own interests. On the other hand, the workers, the people that labored to create everything we need, are given a fraction of the value of what they produce in the form of wages. In other words, every person that survives on their wages is exploited by necessity. We are institutionally coerced to sell our labor (i.e., make money for the capitalist) or fall into abject destitution.

Centrists obviously don’t see the dictatorship. We live in a time where the rule of the wealthy is as normal as the divine right of kings once was. Accordingly, centrists may be sensible enough to see the following trends as problems, but they tend to think of them as entirely disconnected:

• Stagnating wages (despite rising productivity)
• The wealth gap
• Corporate offshoring
• Periodic recessions
• Perpetual aggressive wars
• Millions around the globe living in abject poverty
• Literal slavery abroad to produce cheaper consumer goods
• Literal slavery domestically in prisons
• Skyrocketing cost of living (food, shelter, gas, education, healthcare, childcare, etc)
• Functional monopolies (despite anti-monopoly laws)
• Politicians in the pockets of billionaires
• Climate change (despite decades of warning from scientists)

Marxist theory can explain all of these problems, and in many cases predicted them before they happened. But if the billionaires can convince people like you that a better economic system is synonymous with authoritarianism, and that continuing capitalist wealth extraction is the reasonable “center” position, then they can prevent the workers from banding together against the ruling class.

To be fair, I am bad at picking titles. So there’s that

This is a shitposting sub and it’s funny to get people to click on a NSFW post titled “Hot Mouse Ass”. Or were you upset that the post failed to deliver?

Reading 19th-20th century theory on the internal contradictions and inherent exploitation of capitalism offers a very convincing framework for understanding our current reality. To paint such analyses as naivete ironically reveals a lack of familiarity with the subject matter.

Yeah there is a massive range of disagreement under the umbrella term “leftists”. Marxist, Marxist-Leninist, Trotskyist, Maoist, Communization theory, Anarcho-communist, Eco-anarchist, Christian anarchist, etc. etc.

The political spectrum in the U.S. omits leftists entirely. Both Republicans and Democrats are pro-capitalism and pro-U.S. imperialism.

Easy, they just conclude that only white males are qualified. You know, because white supremacy and sexism.

As a POC, I’ve encountered this form of argument implicitly in several conversations. Why do X group of people not have better outcomes concerning some metric? Don’t blame the system (it’s a meritocracy) so blame the group of people.

In how many worlds did the internal contradictions of capitalism lead us into a global fascist techno-feudalism? That’s what I’d like to know.

Particularly good

Actually inspiring.

omg I am so sorry

I try to take care of my health as much as possible because I cannot afford to have a medical emergency.

If you only saw a bear in a circus you would think it’s nature was to ride a unicycle.

Humans have had to live in brutish/nasty conditions; including the present day, where many of us are drowning in debt, two paychecks away from homelessness while a few are trying to make more money than they could ever spend.