I havent read much theory but here goes

Rules TBD.
I havent read much theory but here goes

It's a tricky quiz because my answers to a lot of these questions aren't simple enough. This quiz makes sparks when you bump it against nuance. I'll just highlight a few of these, a lot of them didn't sit well with me. A lot of these questions feel like they're "baiting" you for a specific view you don't actually hold. Several questions on the quiz strike me as abstract and half-baked. Honestly screw this test tbh... Too much "Only", too much "Must", this quiz deals in ludicrous absolutes.
This question, it is a nothingburger, it's too vague to have any value to the test whatsoever. It could mean literally anything depending on how its framed. Cutting down a hedge that spoils my view is a "small scale destruction of nature". The same argument could be used to justify building a Walmart over a protected wetland. This question compresses trivial gardening and corporate ecological devastation into the same moral bucket. My REAL answer, in real ethics language, is:
“Sometimes limited ecological modification may be necessary but the framing ‘acceptable if it benefits humanity’ is dangerous, underspecified, and historically abused.”
I reject foreign control over domestic policy, but support external pressure when human rights are violated. Where does that put me? Neutral would understate my conviction, strongly agree implies that foreign officials should NEVER influence another country. Disagree would imply support for dominance, coercive intervention, or global governance overriding nations
Loose & decentralized organizations protect values better, but tight & centralized organizations win fights better. There are tradeoffs.
This is a toughie, the problem is this part: “...as long as the final outcome is positive”. The problem is that this assumes three things that do not exist in reality:
Completely reliable foresight
Objective agreement on “positive”
Controlled causality between violence and outcome
History shows that everyone who commits political violence believes the outcome will be positive. Many of the most catastrophic regimes in history have justified their violence with “The final outcome will be good.”. I feel this question is a trick, my key issue is that I believe the question is not asking:
“Is violence ever justified under extreme circumstances?”
It is asking something much more dangerous and much broader:
“Is revolutionary violence acceptable as long as someone believes the final outcome will be positive?” This is blank-check consequentialism which could be used to justify Mass violence, Terror campaigns, Political purges, Civilian casualties and Authoritarian crackdowns to name a few. I hit disagree on this because I will explicitly state that sometimes violence may be tragically necessary, but it is never automatically justified by promised futures or ideological certainty. This rules out "Strongly Disagree" but I also don't necessarily agree either.
I reject the forced comparison. Treating this as an either/or is bad systems thinking. Spontaneous mass action and careful planning are complementary, not competitors.
This lumps things that are NOT THE SAME together. I reject the idea that all nationalism and patriotism is inherently unacceptable in a socialist society. Blind flag-worship and authoritarian nationalism are toxic, but a critical, value-based patriotism rooted in equality, equity, liberty, and holding a nation accountable to its own best ideals is not only acceptable, it’s often necessary for meaningful change. Loving a country enough to challenge its failures is not the same as excusing its power.
Three huge problems:
“Revolution” is undefined. Do you mean:
Violent uprising? Mass general strike? Electoral rupture? Legal-constitutional overthrow? Elite collapse under pressure?
These are not the same thing at all.
This question is built on fear-framing and absolutism.!
Reformist (60.3%) vs Revolutionary (39.7%)
This is Accurate, but for the wrong reasons. I believe this test badly compresses reality.
This one is numerically close, but it misunderstands why. I’m not anti-revolution because I think the system will gently fix itself if we ask nicely. I don’t believe that for a second. I’m skeptical of revolution as a romantic default because history shows over and over that violent rupture is just as likely to midwife a new tyranny as a just society. What I actually believe in is coercive reform via strikes, mass disruption, taxation, seizure through statute, regulatory clamps, and public force that is structural rather than chaotic. This axis treats “revolution” as passion and “reform” as politeness, which is just inaccurate. I don’t want polite. I want effective without becoming monstrous.
Scientific (57.8%) vs Utopian (42.2%)
Accurate
I don’t believe in destiny narratives or historical inevitability. I believe in thermodynamics, logistics, climate models, infrastructure bottlenecks, and failure modes. I don’t think history has a moral arc that saves us by default. If anything, systems rot quietly when they aren’t constrained. My politics are grounded in constraint, not prophecy. I care about what works under pressure, not what sounds righteous on a poster. So many of these damn questions are "ALWAYS" this and "MUST" that.
Decentralist (65%) vs Centralist (35%)
Basically correct. I deeply distrust monoculture power; single spines of authority, single ideologies, single parties, single command centers. They’re fragile, corruptible, and catastrophic when they fail. At the same time, I’m not an anarchist who thinks we can coordinate climate engineering and continental power grids with vibes and community meetings alone. I believe in layered systems: local where possible, centralized where necessary, never unified where it becomes unaccountable.
International (57.1%) vs National (42.9%)
This one is technically right and emotionally wrong. I reject ethno-nationalism and imperial supremacy completely. I also believe planetary ecological coordination is non-negotiable. But I don’t believe belonging, culture, and civic identity should be erased in the name of abstract globalism. I believe in international responsibility and local moral inheritance at the same time. The test treats those as opposites. They’re not.
Party (53.8%) vs Union (46.2%)
This one reads me as “torn,” which is true only if you assume purity is the goal. I don’t trust any single institution to carry the entire weight of social transformation. Parties drift. Unions fracture. Movements exhaust themselves. Dipshits who are part of a union voted for Trump even though he makes actively destructive choices for their way of life at every turn. This test can’t distinguish strategic pluralism from indecision.
Ecological (72.2%) vs Productivist (27.8%)
If anything, this undershoots me. I don’t treat the biosphere as one interest among many. It’s the substrate everything else runs on. Production that destroys the future is a high crime. We need to safeguard our habitable biosphere at any and all costs. I accept that output may fall. I accept that comfort may shrink. Infinite growth is not sustainable in any natural system.
Progressive (85.3%) vs Conservative (14.7%)
This one is obvious and almost too easy to include. Equity, minority protections, gender freedom, movement across borders, disability access, and dismantling inherited hierarchy aren’t “trendy politics” to me—they’re baseline justice in a world that can absolutely afford it even if it pretends it doesn't.
Overall, the label “Democratic Socialism” is not wrong, but it is far too small for what I actually believe. Structurally, this test has a deep problem: it constantly confuses values with mechanisms and mechanisms with outcomes. It uses a constant barrage of absolutist language "must", "only", "always", "inevitable" as if the whole of human history were a simple logic puzzle. It treats ideology like a form of astrology instead of something that has to survive contact with physics, ecology, corruption, human fear, greed, and institutional decay. It cannot represent someone who believes in equality of dignity, equity of outcome, coercion through law rather than violence, decentralization without fragmentation, and global coordination without global absolutism.
And don't get me wrong, I fucking LOVE a good violent fantasy game/movie/etc, it's just rare that such a thing actually goes super well in reality.
But yeah here's my god damn "Here's my facebook personality quiz results :o!" Sorry, this made me weirdly super mad for some reason I'm off my meds today.
Regarding this section:
Scientific (57.8%) vs Utopian (42.2%)
Accurate
I don’t believe in destiny narratives or historical inevitability. I believe in thermodynamics, logistics, climate models, infrastructure bottlenecks, and failure modes. I don’t think history has a moral arc that saves us by default. If anything, systems rot quietly when they aren’t constrained. My politics are grounded in constraint, not prophecy. I care about what works under pressure, not what sounds righteous on a poster. So many of these damn questions are “ALWAYS” this and “MUST” that.
It seems your results betray your analysis. Historical materialism doesn't rely on prophesy, but on analyzing trends. It doesn't know the future, but it predicts likely outcomes based on historical trends. If you care more about what works under pressure and less about sloganeering, then you should've scored higher on the scientific scale.
I agree that the quiz is bad, but I'm not sure you had the background knowledge that the utopianism vs scientific socialism sections were testing on.
i had to take that leftvalues quiz again for this comment:
Q: Some small scale destruction of nature is acceptable if it notably benefits humanity.
A: don't destroy nature, please - disagree.
Q: Foreign officials have no right to dictate policy in another country.
A: i think they should - strongly disagree.
Q: 'Socialist organizations are generally better off when organized loosely and decentrally.'
A: maybe, maybe not - neutral/unsure.
Q: Revolutionary violence is acceptable as long as the final outcome is positive.
A: i think government reforms should be necessary for the switch to socialism, but if the government tries to suppress it, we might as well reluctantly use force in a revolution - neutral/unsure.
Q: Mass spontaneous actions are more effective than carefully planned actions.
A: i think actions should be planned - neutral/unsure.
Q: Nationalism and patriotism are impulses that are unacceptable in a socialist society.”
A: you can be socialist AND support your country - neutral/unsure
Q: Revolution is the best way of achieving a socialist society.
A: ...if the government tries to suppresses socialist reforms - agree.
Q: Measures to address environmental issues are unacceptable if they result in significant decreases in production and quality of life.
A: no comment - neutral/unsure.
here are my results - still got 'centrist marxism':

basically:
revolution vs. reform: NOT anti-revolution, but i support reform (with revolution being an option for when the government suppresses socialist reforms) - leaning towards reformism. shoutout to eduard bernstein.
scientific or utopian?: scientific, probably
central vs. decentral: who cares? everyone just want a say in the government
international or national: very internationalist
party or union?: still both!
production or nature: leaning towards ecology
progressive or conservative: progressive
oh and what meds were you taking, and is there any reason why?
I'm a Marxist-Leninist, here are my results.

This test isn't to tell you what you are, but instead what the test maker thinks you are. What you are is ultimately up to you. If you or anyone else wants to get started on reading Marxist-Leninist theory, I made an introductory reading list.
This one isn't too bad for an internet political test, though i would said that eco-marxism is pretty misleading since all the notable ML parties are proecological nowadays and in 1910's that question was much less pressing.
I did get ML result so lol.
Yea, they require you to pick nationalist answers to get ML but the ML stance on nationalism depends on if you're in the global north or global south, ie does your nationalism work against imperialism or towards perpetuating it. It also requires the person to pick production over ecology.
the ML stance on nationalism depends
It's almost as if there is context and these quizes always have simple questions without such context.
Yep, they're neat as novelty but not as a perscription of ideology.
the ML stance on nationalism depends on if you’re in the global north or global south, ie does your nationalism work against imperialism or towards perpetuating it
Yeah
I don’t think any actual MLs can get the ML result lol
This contradicts the sentence above, just look at AES states. I mean nationalism will always be a crutch for socialist states but its an useful crutch at least as long as imperialists are out there.
Yes, but the questions are framed in a way that make it seem odd.
"Nationalism and patriotism are impulses that are unacceptable in socialist society" is phrased in a manner that either means you agree with nationalism within socialism or you don't, not if they have context. It has nothing to do with your present country, that's entirely on the user's interpretation. Someone in the global south and the global north both see the same question the same way, as it doesn't tie the answer to the north or south. The correct answer is that it's useful in resisting imperialism and horrible if used to perpetuate it.
There's also the fact that it requires you to take a productvist approach over an ecological one, and the way those questions are phrased are bad as well. We should work to increase production in a green manner, not become an anarcho-primitivist, yet the quiz hints like those are the counterposed ideas.
Agree, it's the same reason why nobody ever lands in red sector in the cumpiss test, although to much lesser extent.
Agreed, I always got lib left and back in my non-Marxist days I assumed that meant I was more aligned with anarchists. Thankfully reading theory helped me understand more.

For some of these questions, I felt I lacked a sufficient understanding to provide a confident answer. That led to more neutral/unsure answers than I would have preferred.

The quiz nailed the fact that I'm an anarcho-communist. I think my numbers "suffered" a bit because there are questions where I personally hold beliefs about which choices are easiest to implement, but I also believe that a collective of reasonable people could make some other choice and implement it in a liberatory way. In particular, I'm not against planning certain segments of the economy (e.g. electrical power distribution) as long as we do it with the continuous consent of the people and we don't kill people/collectives who go their own way. Similarly, I'm pretty staunchly anti-markets, but I'm not closed to the idea that reasonable people could live happy lives under genuinely anarchistic market socialism if for some reason a community chooses to continuously consent to that mode of living.

Seems about right I think, there were a few questions that were phrased in a way that I couldn't easily agree or disagree with, but I suppose that might have been the point.

more ecological than the last time, because of you know waves hand at the everything
Another "Eco-Marxist" reporting for duty 🫡

Here are mine. I don't think about (or know?) what ideology i'd adhere to, but i'm not sure it matters much. Imo it's my views/opinions of the concepts themselves that are important, not a big-tent name of an ideology.
I am still not comfortable enough with my grasp of marxism/anarchism/etc (still reading theory to understand them all. I've been progressing well) to the point i could answer properly to these questions so it's probably not reflective of my actual views,
Nonetheless i of course get this is just a fun little online test, nothing serious ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Congrats on your studies! Anything stand out to you particularly, whether it's anarchist or Marxist? As in, particularly useful, enjoyable, etc?
Thanks!
I don't like to tackle more than one subject at once, so currently I'm just focusing on Marxism, which i have unfortunately limited time for, but i still try :) iirc I've read/am reading currently:
And thanks to the last text, I think I have a good framework of what i should focus on while studying; i.e.:
I've actually been using your reading list as a good starting point (thanks for that, by the way!) so far, I'm only loosely using it to know what I should read next, since i already recognize a ton of the material there anyway, but it is still very useful for it to be organized well. But eventually I'll probably follow it more strictly for the sake of accuracy.
After I'm finished with the principles of communism, I'd have completed my current 3 'to read' texts and move on to the next one, which would probably be: What is to be Done, The Wretched of the Earth, and (tediously 🫠) all volumes of Capital.
Although, an important point now for me is trying to re-understand history/figures. I've found it easy to like Marx+Engels/Castro/Ho Chi Minh (and by extension, more fairly analyze Cuba/Vietnam + read their works without a negative bias), since there's very little hatred towards them in my region/on the online spaces i regular, but a lot of material that most Marxists today consider crucial, I have negative/mixed views towards the authors; but in fairness most of my negative views have been earned years before, and I'm no stranger [now] to how propaganda can reframe even good people into being "scary baby eaters", so my goal as of now is trying to read on important figures and change my opinions on them, for better or worse. Of course, I'm not saying my views are wrong and I should force them to be positive, but a critical re-analysis of them all would be very useful. If they are bad people, then that's that, and there's nothing I could do about it, but otherwise, it would help me a lot in reading their works, and in general, change my world-view.
Okay, this comment is getting long lol. Thanks again for the reading list :D
That's awesome!
Harman's How Marxism Works, outside of the weird misogyny and Trotskyist parts, is legitimately a good place to start. It's clear and concise.
You've nailed the 3 core areas, those being dialectical materialism, the law of value, and class struggle. Dialectical materialism applied to history becomes historical materialism, and broadly ties to class struggle, which you correctly point out as the driving force behind the progression of historical modes of production.
Class struggle also informs class ideology, ie the petite bourgeoisie tends to go for more individualist ideologies while the proletariat understands the importance of collectivization, because how we live and produce informs how we understand the world. Mao's On Practice & On Contradiction is probably the single best pair of shorter essays on driving this home and developing it.
If I may make a suggestion, skip What is to be Done? for now. That's more of an article talking about strategy, and while useful, isn't very important for grasping the basis of Marxism. I'd say Imperialism, the Current Highest Stage of Capitalism and The State and Revolution are both more immediately important, but before them I would suggest more than any other single work Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (or better yet, Anti-Dühring). This right here is what will dramatically expand upon and tie together everything you've learned thus far.
Capital can honestly be postponed for quite a while, I consider it critical but quite advanced. Excellent choice with Fanon though, The Wretched of the Earth is a banger.
As for the figures I'm assuming you're referring to, I highly recommend Domenico Losurdo's Stalin: The History and Critique of a Black Legend. Stalin wasn't a saint, and this book doesn't make him out to be one, it tries to correctly separate the "black legend" from the man in reality and place him in his correct historical context, using only western, anti-communist sources. Sadly I don't know of a book of a similar caliber for Mao, but I also find Mao isn't as heavily demonized as Stalin is. The closest is Nia Frome's short essay "Tankies."
Anna Louise Strong's works, such as This Soviet World, are excellent ways to expand your knowledge of what the USSR was actually like from someone on the ground reporting on it. Also beloved by me are Michael Parenti's Blackshirts and Reds and the "Yellow Parenti" speech.
And thanks for the kind words on the reading guide!
Every time I look over and refresh the comment seems to change.
I'm a perfectionist over the smallest things, and get lazy with larger projects 🫠
Good to know my understanding to this point has been correct! And as for dialectics, I've been trying to figure out good examples on how to apply it to understand a situation but did not understand how. Based on your comment, are dialectics in Marxism only really used for Historical materialism, or is it used for more applications? If so, then I see I was wrong in trying to understand dialectics without looking at historical materialism 🙃
And the class struggle explanation makes sense. Just a question, do the labor aristocracy count as petite bourgeoisie, or are they the non capital/land-owning equivalent? That would explain on why more middle class people I meet (even the progressives/leftists sometimes :/) are more likely to support imperialism / liberalism to preserve their own material conditions, at the cost of others. And I'll read the two texts, thanks
Thank you very much for the suggestions ❤️ I've always wanted to read wretched of the earth/how Europe underdeveloped Africa, but I knew I should at least get familiar with Marxism first, since both books are Marxist, the majority of national liberation movements are Marxist. These books/facts are very important to me personally, since before I even considered myself a socialist, I was still firmly anti-imperialist/anti-colonial since that's the only solution the turmoil in the middle east, and the rest of the global south.
And yup, Stalin and Mao are the ones I take issue with. I used to do so too for Lenin, Castro (not a huge extent but there is still a lot of BS around him, unfortunately) but my views toward them softened, since Lenin's work emphasizes democracy but the USSR was in big turmoil, but it was the very first, and only in its time Marxist state that had to face WW1 which they suffered hugely + a devastating civil war where there was a huge coalition against the reds, the economic turmoil due to both these wars and new governance at once and that he had an assassination attempt on his life, it's easy to see why things turned the way they are for his time. Ultimately though the USSR under Lenin was incredibly progressive in comparison to the Tsar a few years ago, and the strides in literacy, healthcare and him giving more rights for the minorities in the Union was very admirable despite all his faults. I have the same opinion here about Fidel, lots of errors but the CIA was constantly attempting to kill him, the bay of pigs, and worst of all the embargo, comparing him to Batista the difference is astonishing. The mark twain quote about two reigns of terror applies pretty well.
But Stalin? From what I've heard, i don't think much good of him. I will read the book you recommended about him, though! As for Mao, I think the same reasoning applies above too somewhat, but the mismanagement of the cultural revolution, great leap forward and four pests campaign is hard to ignore. I definitely haven't done enough reading on these events and hope I'll learn more soon.
This Soviet world, along with the book "Soviet democracy" I see you comment a lot about definitely sound like good books to get hands on. Thank you! And damn I love Parenti. I listened to his 'Imperialism and Drugs' speech and fell in love immediately lol. I haven't watched the yellow parenti speech (yet) but I adore the quote about how countries are rich, not underdeveloped; its their working classes that are overexploited :)
Good questions!
First off, dialectical materialism is the single greatest tool of Marxism. Marx used it when writing Capital, it's critical to class struggle, it's why we have historical materialism. Dialectical materialism is a way of thinking about forces and change, and the motions of change in the world. Not to keep sending book recommendations, but Engels' work Dialectics of Nature goes over the immense applicability of dialectics to everything (though this is a more advanced text IMO, and quite lengthy). Same applies to Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism.
Mao's On Practice & On Contradiction are critical for understanding dialectical materialism because the former goes over the dialectical materialist approach to understanding the unity of theory and practice, and the latter helps us understand the nature of contradiction. Contradiction is what compels movement, in a way, and by identifying imperialism as the primary contradiction, it's useful for identifying what movements to support in overthrowing that, such as Palestinian liberation.
As for the labor aristocracy, they are ultimately the upper stratum of the proletariat. They are kind of like a subclass, if you will. Petite bourgeois relations push towards individualism and fascism as they fear being proletarianized, but the labor aristocracy are already proletarianized, just bribed by the spoils of imperialism into supporting it, or opposing anything that meaningfully represents an alternative. A good look at class ideology is the incredibly short essay Stalin's Shoemaker, which traces a worker that finds himself in different occupations and thus his mindset changes until ultimately being proletarianized and naturally adopts a more proletarian mindset.
Your third paragraph is excellent, and Ho Chi Minh's The Path Which Led me to Leninism describes exactly why so many anti-imperialists come to Marxism-Leninism. Marxism-Leninism's strong stance on national liberation struggles and effectiveness in leading them is exactly why it is so prevalent. Both Fanon and Rodney are excellent reads, great choices.
One thing about Lenin and the progressive achievements of the USSR under him is that Lenin died very early on, and it was ultimately Stalin that had to take on that task. Sverdlov, the most likely candidate for General Secretary, was dead, and Trotsky distrusted the peasantry and had menshevik tendencies towards splitting and infighting. For all of Stalin's faults, it was ultimately Stalin that carried on Lenin's legacy in the midst of siege and incredible turmoil. The CPC rates Stalin and Mao both at 70% good, 30% bad, and I think that can help contextualize that we don't idolize these figures just because we agree with much of what they wrote and did. There's also much to critique.
For Mao, the CPC is very negative on the Cultural Revolution and Four Pests Campaign. The Great Leap Forward is more mixed, but the prior two were seen largely as mistakes even if the reasoning for attempting them were solid. Marxist-Leninist-Maoists uphold the Cultural Revolution and believe it universal to successful socialism, they just believe Mao failed. I'm not an MLM though, and neither was Mao, Mao was an ML. Hope that tangent made sense!
I love that you love Parenti, haha. The "Yellow Parenti" speech is honestly responsible for creating countless MLs, as is Blackshirts and Reds. Anna Louise Strong wrote This Soviet World in the 1930s, so it's a good look at what the early USSR was like, as was Soviet Democracy. A good intro though to some of the history and context of AES are the Prolewiki pages on The USSR and on The PRC before you delve deeper into these.
Awesome work on your journey so far!
Thank you very much for your kind words and guidance ☺️ I'll definitely try out the suggestions and recommendations!
Besides the writers of the works themselves, you've probably been the single most influential person to me in my learning lol. As always, have a great week! C:
That's way too kind of you, in reality it was your own willingness to learn that's been the primary mover. See, that's the fun bit about dialectical materialism, you can't just shout theory at someone and have them desire to learn it. Your environment shapes you by responding to that which is internal to you. A seed only becomes a tree because it's placed in soil with good water, nutrition, and light, but placing a stone in the soil won't create a tree no matter what conditions you put it in.
Just a cheeky example of Diamat, haha.
Have a great week, and thank you so much!

Funny, I wouldn't consider myself an "Orthodox Marxist," I'd say that my positions have been influenced more by Lenin, if anything I tend to view Marx as somewhat dated and inaccessible. I just mean to say, a lot has happened since Marx was alive and it's important to look at what has been tried and what has succeeded and failed rather than rigidly adhering to, well, "Orthodox" Marxism.