Reply #56: Analyzing Marx from a Freudian perspective is rubbish, because it's ahistorical.

[Writer]

Yes, there are plenty of issues with Marx, and certainly with pure socialism:

1. His socialist model assumes that an economy will always grow; he doesn't explain what will happen if the economy goes south and cannot attend to the needs of the worker. What answer does socialism provide then?

2. He fails to ground his idea of "false consciousness" in anything concrete. (How exactly does this ACTUALLY WORK in society?) It wasn't until Althusser's development of the subjective construct of the ideological state apparatus (ISA) that there was any grounding of this idea.

3. He assumes that the proletariat will grow uncomfortable and rise up to overthrow the superstructure. His "revolution" never really occurred in capitalist nations because our basic needs have been met. (i.e. We eat.)

4. Another problem is that too many have ripped up Marxian logic in order to craft ungrounded links of ideological power between the state and institutions based on simplistic notions of currency exchanges. (See: Chomsky, Noam.) This has seriously damaged the left's ability to serve as true media advocates. We cannot describe how these exchanges lead to the formation of ideology, especially within the proletariat (and don't get me started on Chomsky's naive propaganda model), so we cannot describe how a superior media system is supposed to function REALISTICALLY.


Marx was an idealist, yes, much in the same way as liberalism is an ideal. But don't try to use psychoanalysis as a means to describe why people won't rise up. The problem is within our social structures and our histories.