The Gen-Z Manifesto: What We Can Take and What We Should Leave From Karl Marx & Co.

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Communism — whether you’re for it, against it or just briefly dipping your toe in the hella-rad halfway point of socialism — is historically an absolute dumpster fire of an economic system. Communism is a turner of the tides, and not in a beautiful lunar orb way; take, for example, Communist Vietnam. While Vietnam didn’t sink itself, it was the threat of The Big bBad Red that ultimately got the United States involved. Communist Russia was established as a way to take back the rights of the people, but it ultimately caused the dissolution of the USSR and set the stage for the Russia we know today. 

For these reasons and countless other ethical and ideological discrepancies, “The Communist Manifesto” by Karl Marx and Friederich Engels is often labeled as taboo. It’s taken the frustration with the status quo combined with unlimited internet access to finally bring about the revival of the 30-page pamphlet, which is seeing a resurgence in Gen-Z leftist communities. However, although I’ll admit that I am involved in that community, I don’t necessarily think I’m up to snuff on my knowledge of Communist literature. So, as part of my effort to know everything there is to know and be a super genius (aim high, kids), I’ve taken it upon myself to read the entire text and provide my own commentary. After all, if I’m going to be a true radical American communist secret agent, I should probably know what I’m talking about … right, Ted Cruz?

‘The Communist Manifesto’: What I Liked

The authors were very real about the vibe of capitalism. To quote directly from the manifesto, Marx and Engels note that “society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes, directly facing each other.” While this might be a bit of a dramatization (this is considered to be one of the most effective propaganda pieces of all time — they’re bound to jazz it up a little), they are right. Capitalism is really good at dividing people into haves and have-nots. There is a lot of luck in getting ahead in a capitalist society, and the somewhat self-governed nature of the economy means that those who get lucky can then be in control and act in their own interest, furthering the disparity. As a further commentary on the economic toxicity of a capitalist society, Marx and Engels have a clever metaphor woven throughout the piece, framing money as the “ruler of society.” This rings very true and is evidenced by a lot of the finance-forward decisions taking place daily in United States politics.

I also enjoyed the focus on feminism and justice for victims of ageism. There’s a section of the manifesto that directly calls out employers that value or devalue workers based on their age and sex, saying that these categories only serve to justify maltreatment of the Proletariat. This remains incredibly relevant to the struggles of sexism and ageism in both the workplace and the world at large, calling out the value assigned to people based on things they cannot control and that ultimately aren’t incredibly relevant to whether they’re “good” or “bad” at contributing to society.

The third section I liked centered around empowerment and community. The latter half of the pamphlet explores how the Proletariat and the Communist Party can work together in order to create a community that serves the needs of the Proletariat and rights the wrongs that had been inflicted upon them by the Bourgeoisie. While this is most likely just a propaganda tactic, it also calls attention to the autonomy and power that the working class has over what happens to them and builds a sense of community between the two groups that might not have much overlap otherwise. Empowering marginalized or oppressed groups and creating a strong group dynamic are necessary for effective and meaningful change to happen.

Fourth, I loved the craftmanship! The absolute poetic balls on these men … There are tons of lines in here that you can quote if you want to be mysterious and sound like a plague doctor. My personal favorite: “The robe of speculative cobwebs, embroidered with flowers of rhetoric, steeped in the dew of sickly sentiment, this transcendental robe in which the German Socialists wrapped their sorry ‘eternal truths,’ all skin and bone, served to wonderfully increase the sale of their goods amongst such a public.” I’m gonna sprinkle that in during my next job interview. That’s how much I love it.

‘The Communist Manifesto’: What I Didn’t Like

I did not appreciate the extreme divisiveness. The general thread of the text is overthrowing the Bourgeoisie, and the authors suggest that the rich and the working class can never work together. This is intended to create unity between the members of the Proletariat in order to mobilize them to make change. However, within the structure of modern political happenings and decision making, it’s virtually impossible to exclude a group’s ideologies in order to make choices on a global scale. You don’t have to accept the opposing group’s beliefs or actions, but they are people on Earth, and we have to come to terms with their existence and deal with it accordingly. We can’t just get rid of the people we don’t like; we have to work hard to understand how we can work together with them to achieve our goals. (Which is easier said than done — I definitely don’t want to be working with Ted Cruz on anything in the near future, but unfortunately he’s still on this planet, and we just have to deal.) To sum it up, sometimes you have to reach beyond yourself and deal with terrible, horrible people in the name of getting things done, especially in today’s political climate.

It also disappoints me that the general public in the 21st century isn’t going to have time to sit down and analytically read the entire document. One of the great things about this text is the complexities, metaphors and subtle messaging that can resonate with anyone. It’s a very universally applicable text when applied sparingly in bits and pieces, and if you have the spare time to parse through the document, it’s a great read. However, there’s a lot to wade through in between the good bits, and it requires a lot of time to think that most modern-day people don’t really have because they’re working crazy hours and have to go through the trials and tribulations of living in a late-stage Capitalist society. It comes full circle to our central idea: Communism, folks.

TL;DR

Obviously, there are a lot of issues with “The Communist Manifesto” that I haven’t even touched on, especially in terms of discussing the personal views of the authors outside the writing of this piece. A notable example is Marx’s essay on Judaism, which is widely criticized in the Jewish community due to its tongue-in-cheek descriptions of Jewish people. However, in terms of creating our own “Gen-Z Manifesto,” a set of guiding principles and statements to let those in charge know that our generation means business and will be shaking up the status quo. For a text intended to unite us all against the perils of the modern world and empower us to take action against what we know to be unjust, “The Communist Manifesto” does provide some general guidelines about what we might expect to include (and what should be left out). The “Gen-Z Manifesto” needs to be a carefully crafted, widely applicable document that specifically call out issues that we would like to see righted, with strong themes of global community rather than an uprising of one particular group against another.  

It needs to be accessible to even those who only have a few minutes to spare, and we need to make sure it is relevant to what’s going on in the world at the moment, yet timeless so that future generations can draw on it later as they begin their own revolution. In terms of what we should take from the original document, I believe that the rich sense of community and strong themes of justice would be excellent central themes. The complexity and extreme divisiveness, however, are elements I’d leave behind. And while I’m not at all suggesting that we take any of the pieces of advice that Marx and Engels offer in a literal sense, I do believe in the most basic form of their message, especially in the context of the 21st century: Something is wrong, and we have to come together to make it right.

If you’d like to take a look at the original text yourself, click here.