Are any of these philosophers useful for leftists to read?

Do you want to understand Marx or philosophy?

I'm asking if any of the philosophers I've listed are useful for leftists.

yes
Not even as a leftist, you should just read him in general
If you live in a western nation yes absolutely but good to read regardless
ehhh… wouldn't hurt I guess
yes
Yes
No idea, never read him
Yes

Yes and Guattari has books on politics which are pretty good, try the Three Ecologies and Caosmosis. He does have his limits as his praxis didn't really go anywhere, which shouldn't be a problem for a leftcom. Also Anti-Oedipus>Thousand Plateaus.
I've only read Minima Moralia which was pretty good.

Why?

Everyone should read Nietzsche. He is the ultimate anti-spook thinker, he does Stirner better than Stirner. Leftists should understand the resentment (resentiment) at the heart of moralism which is so prevalent on the left, and how this at odds with affirmation of life and struggle.

I am reading Deleuze/Guattari currently, and its pretty much a mindfuck. The main point seems to be that the error of previous thinkers (Marx, Freud) is that they don't account for multiplicity and complexity. This is definitely interesting and I think it makes your analysis more sophisticated, but ultimately I'm not sure it provides any concrete answers about how to understand the world and change it. I would recommend it after you read Marx to understand some of his limitations.

Is it worth reading Derrida? There's a lot of butthurt about him, which makes me curious.

I tried reading Derrida's Grammatology, and it seemed like a waste of time to me. It was like 500 pages of deconstructing Rousseau for no apparent reason. I guess if you're into that sort of thing its fine, but I wouldn't expect any kind of positive argument or understanding to come from it.

...

Yeah I've read Stirner before and wasn't impressed. He comes off as a whiny kid compared to Nietzsche who was actually sophisticated.

no. nietzche tries to put something in the place of the old morality. he doesnt transcend.

PoMo philosophers are just bullshit merchants.

Lmao do you also read Bordiga just because he sounds sophisticated? It would actually explain a lot about leftcoms.

I'd gather he means in terms of their critiques of morality. Nietzsche is miles ahead in the breadth of his analysis.

How so?

I'm sure reading Stirner if you haven't read Nietzsche is impressive, but reading them the other way around like I did, he comes across as pretty basic. Not even a fraction of the talent and imagination of Nietzsche.

His philosophy is transvaluation of all values, in other words fuck all existing values, you create your own.

youtube.com/watch?v=Rd7VeQjlFhM

What's wrong with Bordiga?

He assumes you can be free from all commitment. That's not how it works in reality.

my question is, why is it that so many of the edgy conservative peterson fans i know irl love Nietzche if he's anti-spook? I haven't read him yet personally so i dont get how so many conservatives could jump on him if hes antispook

The answer is that they're idiots. You can read Nietzsche many ways, there are a wealth of interpretations. But if you aren't very sophisticated you can come up with a shit interpretation that just confirms your worldview. He says straight up that his philosophy is only for the select few who will understand.

Because Nietzsche has many readings which can used to support conservatives/right-wing beliefs. Try reading On Nietzsche by Georges Bataille, there he does a marvelous defense of his philosophy and how it was made to look conservative/right-wing, mainly by the interference Nietzsche sister and her husband who was hated by Nietzsche.

And I guess you are one of those select few but the kermit's fans are not?

that isnt true. nietzche still prescribes a romantic struggle in your life in order for you to find "meaning" and become the "most powerful" version of yourself. he rejected the black and white valuations other religions put on people's lives but he himself distinguished between a worthy life and a mediocre one and and made a value judgement between them. stirner realized that the project was to destroy all morality. he championed radical subjectivity unbound by any concrete values at all. nietzche on the other hand destroys values, only to create a few new values and imposes them onto you, for life.

Haven't read him but from my skimming and reading what people post I don't see much more than his idea that the vanguard must be the supposed "organ" that perpetuates itself as the embodiment of proletariat interest. What could I get from Bordiga that I wouldn't get from reading Lenin?

I know he comes off that way, however not a single point he makes comes off as being so blind to the environmental conditions around him. His radical perspectivism as the response to christian morality and its secular offshoots always points to the same thing: shake off what you can of the alien and imparted and begin development from yourself.

this is a straight up lie. Nazis did contort Nietzsche, but the narrative of this being due to his sister is actually a myth.

btw, fascists might bend him, but so do radicals and leftists. left nietzschians are revisionists too

Intimacy Or Integrity By Thomas P. Kasulis - A book on metaphilosophy. Taught me a lot about the different presuppositions that we have when justifying and communicating ethical and political views.

I'm going to need a source on that. Is it not true that she meddled in his writings after his death? Is not true that she and her husband popularized antisemitic and far right readings of him?

hold on while i find you the pdf

Doesn't make Stirner useful though. Nietzsche is miles ahead of him in every way.

I think Nietzsche gets often misunderstood, partly because many people these days have heard about Nietzsche through a second hand source before actually reading his stuff. Thats why Stirner is more respected, he's our own leftist Nietzsche, while Nietzsche himself was appraised by Hitler(who had completely misunderstood him)

Only Adorno because of his analysis of culture industry.

Stirner has nothing to do with leftism. He only became associated with anarchism when Benjamin Tucker translated his work into English.

Yes
One hundred percent yes, horizon of the world in his canon is basically the personal equivalency of Hegel' ontological void
I suppose, though you could easily skip a lot of the transcendental philosophers by reading Lacan
Yes, one of the most intelligent rightists insofar as he enumerated on Wittgenstein and philosophy as a relation to language as being. This is a fundamental part of what would develop into Althusser, Badiou, etc. and modern Marxian philosophy
Kulturkritik at its finest. Very in depth discussion of the development of the modern ideology of capital and its historicity with regards to the eclipse of the absolute subject. Most of the Frankfurt school writers are worth the read
and Levinas and Foucault et al. No, not particularly, they function as the postmodern equivalency of Kierkegaard, except their telos is immutable, individual subjectivity rather than god as an in-itself. They're great to read for a better understanding, but be wary of the deal they offer you. It's basically just semi-spiritual orienteering of subjectivity, it's an ideology.
Yes

Alright fuckboy, do you even realize the development that took place from Stirner's work? I don't believe anyone that thinks they're completely distinct

Who's better: Adorno or Deleuze? They contradict each other a lot from what I've heard in regards to metaphysics and shit.

I started to read Adorno and he kinda seems like an asshole, he really hates jazz for some reason (only art music is worth anything apparently). Deleuze has much more modern sensibilities, for one thing because he's writing like 40 years later. Metaphysically, Deleuze is much more out there, I think he wrote while on drugs.

absolute this and anybody who disagrees needs to read more

You could probably get away with reading Nietzsche and get away with it.
Absolutely.
Idk, haven't read him.
You could probably do without reading Heidegger and be just fine.
Haven't read, but from secondhand knowledge he seems like he'd be worth reading.
Probably read Hegel, Nietzsche, and Spinoza first and D&G would be likely be useful to you. Reading D&G can be a bit much for someone without the background necessary to read them.
Early Lyotard is great. Same with early Baudrillard. Reading Bataille first would maybe be a good idea with those two.

baudrillard pwns deluze, foucout, that whole school. He's the best philosopher because he actually presents a (radical) view of 9/11 and the post-9/11 world. Keep moving forward, take his ideas and analyze the internet.

What about. Ludwig Wittgenstein?

Simulacra and SImulation is definitely worth a read. Should probably read Debord first though.

Baudrillard isn't worth reading beyond Symbolic Exchange and Death tbqh.

Explain.

Read all of them and more

It's Baudrillard's most creative, incisive, and radical work. It's the work that came before Simulation and Simulacra, and he hadn't quite succumbed to idealism at that point so it's more coherent than his latter works imo. It's also really enjoyable to read, which isn't something I can say about a lot of his writing tbh.

Not really
Poor man's Stirner
Not really unless you're really into christfaggotry
Nazi shit
Good if you take it with a grain of salt
Literally who and literally whom

Yep, it checks out.

Why does philosophy have to be materialist in order to be worthwhile? What's wrong with idealism?

How the fuck can you not know D&G and Lyotard?
Either way: viewpointmag.com/2017/11/09/takes-organizers-make-revolution/
Have this Brazilian guy mixing D&G with Lenin and learn something.

I'm not saying that there's nothing of worth to be found in idealism, but Baudrillard's idealism is kinda lazy and insufferable imo. I think that philosophy should be materialist, or at the very least aim towards internal coherence. Baudrillard doesn't exactly do that.

Why? What do you mean by "materialist?"

By "materialist" I mean it shouldn't take Mind and Consciousness to be the fundamental objects upon which it builds. You have to start somewhere and the mind is a good place to start, but I don't think it should be elevated over every other thing tbqh

I see.

No.

You do know half of those philosophers weren't white according to Holla Forums's definition of "white", right?

Try reading the infamous Latin American socialist revolutionary “Jordè Pederoso”, and clean your room.

You’re thinking of the Scandinavian Marxist “Jörd Pedrset”.

Yes.

The TLP is a HARD text though. You need a guide and maybe even a group.

How the fuck is Wittgenstein useful for leftists?

Understanding language as a game and imperfect is very, very fucking important

We have Derrida for that though.

Just read Philosophical Investigations. My understanding is that he basically repudiated the conclusions of TLP.

Deleuze's politics sucked though. Thanks to him we got 30+ years of useless leftist slacktivism.

Derrida is literally the guy on the internet that brings up dictionary definitions to demonstrate that everyone else is wrong. Keep with Wittgenstein.

I’ve read both.

While Investigations does do away with the TLP’s general nihlism and defeatism (all while being an easier and less schizophrenic read), Wittgenstein’s concept of philosophy of a language game is upheld in the later text.

Why don't you just read instead of being concerned with whether what you're reading is good for leftism?

can't comment, but maybe read selections from the Upanishads instead?
we all seem to agree that he is important for the same reasons. I've read Genealogy of Morals, bits of Beyond Good&Evil. Genealogy is cool if you go on to read the Deleuze/Foucault stuff. Heidegger was also rather taken with old Nietzsche I believe.
can't say. muh leap of faith
I think Being&Time is a great assessment of modernity. My outlook has been very influenced by his conceptions.
Culture Industry was a great read. Negative Dialectics is a harder read, assumes the reader has read the phenomenologists (including Heidegger) and Hegel.
Thousand Plateaus is a mindfuck but pretty cool read. When it's at its best, it's a flow and state of mind. It is a compilation of essays spanning several years, so the topics are diverse. A lot of references to unfamiliar art and literature. I think it can be gotten into without reading the prior work "Anti-Oedipus" which I think is weaker. Deleuze is the more interesting of the two and spot on in his "postscript on societies of control". Guattari isn't bad but not really essential.
former Socialisme ou Barbarie guy, Marxist until "Libidinal Economy" which I'd really like to read sometime

additional mentions
someone mentioned how pomo are bullshitters. He was a pretty knowledgeable critic, but his outlook was cynicism and his practice was just about nil I think. Sort of a Freudo-Marxist.

has a theory of ideology that is very important no matter what your perspective

he certainly has abandoned the Marxist orthodoxy (as should we all) but I think Coming Community is a great text, perhaps Homo Sacer too

Isn't Agamben a crypto-theologian like Badiou?

No, Agamben is a new trasnscendentalist (there is a teleological basis), Badiou is Marxian (there is no telos). Unless you meant like a traditional manner of theologian in which case I guess Žižek and Badiou with their works on the Christian universalism kind of qualify but still not really/

damn guys you just got nae nae'd on

Christianity is not nor has ever been universalist. Zizek and Badiou invented a meme.

Nobody is referring to Christian ideological or institutional edifices, only to its relation to being as event, which acts as a singular universal.

They could have picked a better example instead of Christianity.

read Joseph Smith

I know that guy lmao.

Explain.

They picked what was familiar, and least likely to arouse ire - besides, if christianity in its historicity could be used to invoke agitating towards universality, that would mean a massive potential body from which action towards a new violence might come

Head over to /theory/ and read some of the articles, posts, and shorter pieces. You'll find yourself oriented in some manner with regards to philosophy after.

If you want a place to start listen to Rick Roderick's lecture on him.

Fack off Beterson

Lmao source?

That doesn't really ring true. Both Red Emma and Rudolph Rocker praised Stirner in their works and I hardly think either of them came into contact with his ideas by way of an english translation.

from these only Deleuze and maybe Heidegger is relevant to the left. switch Nietzsche with Stirner and fill the gap with Chomsky and le ebin sniffman.

Any update on this?

onesixtwo.club/scv/

Lenin said you needed to read Hegel to understand marx

Start with the greeks

Metaphysic is empirically verifiable since we can phenomenologically experience our free will to do something. But our will is derived from a natural basic force of an abstract will standing above reason. To live is to suffer. Not insight but art is the way to salvation. Especially music is the most direct representation we know of the abstract will. Negating the will is to Ethic is defined by compassion.

Cons:
-whiny, pessimistic, anthropocentric
Pros:
-voluntaristic, transcultural (influenced by Indian philosophy of brahman), neither materialistic nor idealistic but dialectic

Not him but there is one work which is distorted by the Nazi sister, that book being the Will to Power. From what I understand, all other books are untainted in their publication. Hope that helps

You are like a 100-200 years late to this discussion. In philo and science departments it's almost universally accepted that we can not have such a thing.

Schopenhauer thought free will was a scam because you can do what you will but can't will what to will.

Man, you don't understand either of these words.

Only 12.2% of philosophers state that we have no free will; vast majority are compatibilists. Hell, on the recent philpapers survey "no free will" was the LEAST popular option (behind "other" and "libertarianism")

Post-Modernism is bullshit. It either consists of trivialities or truisms expressed using fancy theoretical structures. Just a bunch of charlatans if you ask me.

Except Christianity's understanding of redemption is inherently chauvinist; i.e. Jeebus comes completely from the outside to "save" humanity from its intrinsically sinful nature, whereas in Judaism we hold that the coming of Moshiach is entirely dependent on our actions. In a sense, our understanding of our relationship to G*d is - as leftists would put it - dialectical. Of course we believe that the existing world is evil but we never hold that passivity/inaction (and therefore innocence) is the way to redemption the way Xtians do (just sit and wait for the Second Coming).

The way western Christianity understands sin is fucked up. You're born with original sin and just have to "believe" in J.C. in order to cleanse yourself entirely. Notice how this prompts western/white Christians to missionize (the Eastern Churches are against proselytizing, interestingly enough) even though they don't really seem to care that much about healing the world in other ways.

Christianity is toxic. Jewish messianism is a much, much better paradigm for the left.

Read this critique of Badiou by Daniel Bensaïd z"l:
marxists.org/archive/bensaid/2004/xx/badiou.htm

What about Lacan? Do you have to read him before you can read Althusser, Deleuze, Badiou, and Zizek?

>hunter.cuny.edu/jns/research/nietzsche-forum-munchen-e.v
>telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/7018535/Criminal-manipulation-of-Nietzsche-by-sister-to-make-him-look-anti-Semitic.html

Seems to me a bit more than that. And I imagine being able to read Christian Niemeyer work would also lead towards more stuff.

I unironically think Kant is good. He actually examined morality in a way that I think is better than crude utilitarianism