One might say that Marx is like Newton, describing/discovering many things and setting a foundation for their field. Saying “we shouldn’t read Newton because his stuff is old” or that his ideas are wrong simply because they are old is ludicrous. Both of them probably had things they got wrong, sure, and newer theory corrects this, but they still set the foundations.
While one might not read Newton directly in school, so for some Marxist theory it is too (see Elementary Principles of Philosophy teaching DiaMat), but Marxs books that haven’t been superseded in this way should still be read.
Fantastic way of putting it! People have iterated on Marx and Lenin, but the basic building blocks were first set by Marx, Engels, Lenin, etc, and as a consequence modern theorists use those tools in new conditions. You must still engage with these tools to have a better idea of how they apply to modern contexts.
Similarly: Saying we shouldn’t read theory, is akin to saying we shouldn’t learn science. You are going to have a very difficult time doing particle physics if you have no understanding of the world. Exactly as we say that without theory you are just going to be redoing the same stuff, so would every scientist have to rediscover the basics.
100%, excellent point comrade. For any onlookers, the concept she is describing here is the foundation of Marx’s notion of Scientific Socialism, analyzing human development as a science like any other in order to master its trajectories. Just like fire was once dangerous and sporadic for cavemen, the advancements in understanding how to start and control fire leaped development forward. So too can mastering the laws of human societal progression and organization.
