I already went over that in another post, the one where I said: “Your clarification does not meaningfully change anything about what I was addressing.”

Then instead of going through and telling me which parts are supposedly still a “misrepresentation”, you told me this:

Again you didn’t read what I wrote. I never said “dont ortganize.”

I am done talking with you. Your arguing against things I didn’t even come close to saying. If you want to argue in bad faith there’s a whole fediverse out there full of libs and chuds.

I’m still not sure what is supposedly a misrepresentation. As it is, I never said that you said not to organize (that is a mouthful). I was addressing the idea of being openly communist as an individual, but not as an org. The idea of being secretly organizing with other communists was taken into account in my criticism of the point of view.

I even emphasized it as an attribute of what I was talking about here:

The concept of communist efforts as a whole solely being guerilla, but not even fully, because they’re actually calling attention to the fact that they’re communist while pretending not to be in orgs, is contradictory nonsense.

So how is this claiming that you said “don’t organize”?

You literally said:

Helping people is great but directly tying that in with your communism is a good way to ruin both.

Which is an incredibly misleading way to put things. This doesn’t need to be about you or I as ego, but about the points of view. And trying to make it about ego does no one any favors.

Its like you read one sentence decided to inject the worst possible meaning into it when the explanation was right there.

Your clarification does not meaningfully change anything about what I was addressing. In fact, it makes even less sense than the idea that communists should be secretive both as individuals and organizations. If you truly believe the state is going to put you in a black van for being a practicing communist, being “loud and proud” as an individual communist, but not as an organization means putting a target on your back and now, not only do you not have anyone to back you up if things go south, you will just be (according to the black van narrative) disappeared quietly and without a fuss since nobody even knows what you’re doing. What you’re describing sounds like adventurism. The concept of some groups and their operations being guerilla in some historical contexts does make sense. The concept of communist efforts as a whole solely being guerilla, but not even fully, because they’re actually calling attention to the fact that they’re communist while pretending not to be in orgs, is contradictory nonsense.

In any case, a premise like “Helping people is great but directly tying that in with your communism is a good way to ruin both.” is a terribly misleading way of talking about things. If you use a premise that is bad, you can’t depend on a lengthy explanation to supposedly fix it. You need to go back and do a premise that is better.

Helping people is great but directly tying that in with your communism is a good way to ruin both.

You can’t raise class consciousness effectively if you pretend communism doesn’t exist and act like you have no affiliation with it. Are there situations some of the time in history where some groups have to act in near total secrecy? Yes. Are there situations where you need to be wary about how obvious you are, especially if you’re in a more vulnerable situation / among a more reactionary group? Yes. But if you’re wanting to organize people, you won’t lead them by pretending you’re something you aren’t. Just as an example, the people who hang out on this forum, I think it’s safe to say many of them would not know it exists and would hardly know what communism is if everyone they had encountered who had communist views had pretended not to.

Tying together communism and helping people on an organized level is actually one of the most effective things that you can do. You help because you believe in helping, but you also tie it into what your aims are, or else people will just assume you’re being charitable because you feel like it and will fill in the blanks with their own narrative about how the world works. Some people awash in western Christian thinking might find it feels icky to combine the two, like you’re somehow undermining the act of kindness by relating it to communism. But the reality is, people seeing that a group consistently does good for them will make them believers far easier than trying to get them to read thick books. And for good reason. People tend to like those who help them get their needs met and do it consistently, without there being some kind of trick or catch to it that undermines them in the process. It’s a sensible reaction. And part of getting past the existing propaganda is showing people that there is an alternative that can not only get their needs met, but do it without all the class/racial/etc. divide and means tested BS.

I would say, a good starting point is acknowledging that the system is stacked against people in the US. Unless you have rich parents to pay for your college, you’re going to be at a disadvantage and even then, you’d end up competing against other kids of rich parents who are vying to get their kids into the same colleges and the same positions.

That said, the baseline everyone probably shares in some way is “to not end up in destitution.” And in that regard, I don’t think jumping into large loans is a good idea. It’s a predatory system and it preys on people who have basically just become adults and can’t possibly intuit well the implications of loans that they could spend decades having to pay off. Add to that how much has become “gig economy” stuff now, making degrees less important and more of a loan burden, overall.

So my recommendation is, unless you’re confident you can (not just want to) pursue a degree in one of the big ones like medicine, finance, or maybe computer science (though even that seems more glutted as a field with all the code bootcamp stuff now), I would not recommend taking out large loans to go to a standard university. Instead, consider cheaper community college stuff while working part-time, trade skills, specializations that require less cost and time investment, but still have a clear path to some kind of work. Will you be missing out on something, if you don’t live in a dorm and go to a four year college? Yeah, but you can also miss that while taking out significant loans, such as if you commute to a college instead of living on/near campus.

Higher education should just be paid for by the state, none of this crap in the way, but while it’s not, if you’re considering your future, don’t be taken for a ride because of a picture of an experience, or a piece of paper, that’s made out to be critical. Instead, make connections in your area, find hobby groups, etc., that’s a good chunk of the socializing from going to a university anyway. You don’t have to be a shut-in if you don’t do the “typical” university “experience” and you could go to a university and be a shut-in anyway. And you don’t have to give up on all specializations and certifications by not doing the “typical” path.

I’m not trying to say there’s one right answer, mind you, but the US is a mess and I think people should take that into account when considering a path. It’s probably going to be bumpier than colleges trying to sell you on enrollment make it out to be.

How would the cops stop them? If everyone has class consciousness at the same time, they can just all refuse to work at the same time and overwhelm the cops. The cops may be considered a separate class, but aren’t a separate entity from society and would quickly feel the effects of everyone turning against them. Even the US 2020 protests had a lot of cops quitting, in spite of it being a fraction of the populace organizing to protest police brutality, specifically, without even necessarily having class consciousness as the backbone of it.

I would venture to say one of the reasons organizing a vanguard is necessary is precisely because it’s so unrealistic to have everyone class conscious at the same time as a precursor to revolution. There is also outside repression too, so if you only had one people/nation class conscious, but not the whole world, then you could still have them violently repressed by outside forces anyway if they have no vanguard. But if we’re hypothesizing everyone the world over being class conscious at the same time, the only way I see repression working for long is if we’re supposing that class consciousness can be undone in this scenario, with violence enough that people cave. Otherwise, I’d think we’re talking about little more than a countdown until the capitalists are overwhelmed, with the worst case scenario for the working class being that the capitalists have a literal fortress to hide themselves in for a while - but even then, there wouldn’t be a whole lot they can rule over from hiding if nobody believes in the system they’re pedaling and understands that the liberation of the working class is more important and valuable to getting everyone’s needs met than any single person being immediately comfortable in the short-term. I’d think we’re talking about a level of belief and understanding that bypasses what could put many off of taking part in revolutionary struggle. Which is unrealistic in part because for many, their overriding concern is going to be when they get to eat next, and they’ll have limited patience for supposed sacrifice to make that better world over existing appearance of guarantees that the current system gives them in this way. And for some them, depending on where they land in money and such, it might be closer to a guarantee while the system lasts, even if it comes from an unsustainable system. So this is where the logistics come in, of being so critical to be capable of replacing the existing system with one that can get people’s immediate needs met, otherwise many will perceive it as a loss, even if it’s technically more “freeing” in the long-term. Along with just the humanitarian concerns, of course, of the point being to improve conditions for people.

Ultimately, I think the hypothetical can be an interesting jumping off point for getting into what it really means for people to be class conscious or not, but in practice, it’s sort of like asking, “What if a moving train suddenly became an airplane?” The consciousness for many is so tied up in their day to day capitalist living, it’s never only a matter of teaching them class consciousness, but also the maintenance of it against the inertia of the existing system and its propaganda and persuasion through how the structure of daily life informs people’s worldview. No one remains in a static state, in other words, and instead is always shifting in relation to internal and external forces.