Karl Marx, born on this day in 1818, was a foundational political theorist and journalist associated with the philosophy of Marxism.
Among Marx's best-known texts are the "The Communist Manifesto" and the three-volume "Das Kapital", in which he set out to define and explain the behavior of the capitalist mode of production.
Marx's political and philosophical thought have had enormous influence on subsequent intellectual, economic and political history, and his name has been used as an adjective, a noun, and a school of social theory.
Marx's critical theories about society, economics and politics - collectively understood as Marxism - hold that human societies develop through class conflict. In capitalism, this manifests itself in the conflict between the ruling classes (known as the bourgeoisie) that control the means of production, and the working classes (known as the proletariat) that enable these means by selling their labor power in return for wages.
Employing a critical approach known as historical materialism, Marx concluded that, like previous socio-economic systems, capitalism produced internal tensions which would lead to its self-destruction and replacement by a new system known as socialism.
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Is anyone else familiar with the experience of having people around you who love to hear you talk but don't actually give a shit about what you're saying?
It's the most infantilising thing. They'll go through the active listening motions but I can tell from their tone that they've checked out. Why the fuck did you ask me about the book I'm reading, or ask me for my take on world events, if you're just going to mhmm your way through the conversation and start folding laundry or whatever? Sometimes I just trail off midsentence and they don't even notice - they just respond with an, "...interesting!" a second later.
I put a lot of work into a tech political project recently, and in the early stages I had scraped a pile of politician's speeches in order to do some word analysis. I described it to a political friend who also works in tech and was met with, "I don't really get the point but it's really cool to see you so excited about something!"
Sometimes I find talking to strangers so much more validating because they have nothing to respond to except what I say.
/rant
A lot of people just love small talk for some reason. I think they like the protocol of it more than the content. Do they go around telling people the same new story about something? The people in my life like that do that too, where they get a nee topic/event/story and repeat it to everyone.
Eh doesn't quite feel like that, as it's only people close to me who do this, and they rarely do any talking themselves. It really feels like they're just trying to show me love or be close to me in an abstract way, and not realizing that their disinterest in the subjects I care about is invalidating that.
It would be fine but it wastes my time and it's a big emotional letdown if I don't clue in soon enough and let myself get excited about something.