Marx for Beginners

I was not a fan of this book. It oversimplified and exaggerated many things, failed to clearly explain other things, and sometimes I felt like the author was arguing a case for Marxism instead of trying to explain it. The bias was heavy, and when I notice that sort of thing, I start taking the contents of the writing with more grains of salt than is healthy.

I have studied Marx a few times during school, and I’ve always thought his ideas were great but utterly impractical. History has been a good enough judge on what happens when countries attempt to implement his philosophy large-scale: it results in dictatorship, stripping of personal freedoms, censorship, military states, and human exploitation. I do not think communism is ever going to be a pure form of society Marx wanted. His aims were too extreme, and I also think he puts way too much blame on economics. The truth is, exploitation is a part of how the world works. Not just the human world, the universe at large. Animals eat other animals, plants compete for sun and water and will strangle each other out if they need to. There is a food chain, and that concept of hierarchy carries over to humanity. True equality and social harmony is impossible; if it’s ever achieved briefly, it will eventually be thrown out of balance again as one group of people becomes dominant. It’s not a good thing, but it’s just the way things are.

But in terms of art, all the talk of exploitation reminded me of the conundrum facing professional illustrators and other skilled artisans. They are under-valued in the market, even though they are rare and highly trained. I’ve had a lot of personal experiences with people trying to pawn cheap art off of me (“I can’t pay you, but it’ll be great exposure!”, and there is a movement online taking a stand against “free art” and speculation art. Very few people value art—you say you’re an artist, and people scoff and make jokes about living in a cardboard box. Yet I, as an artist, have a set of skills that very few people have and are just as necessary to society. Even though we spoke in class last week about how the artist is naturally exploited because they are seen as serving society by default, I think the exploitation goes far beyond the philosophical sense of the word. It translates to job prestige and the wallet too.