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ah hmmm, maybe I should've asked the context of the question directly 😅 (I'll also edit the main post with context). I was confused how the american working class relates to the means of production. so my setup is that in the context of imperialism, the production of people's needs mainly happens outside of america, and it seems that americans' primary source of wealth and well-being comes from those superprofits

so then americans as a whole seem to have power in maintaining this system, from protecting it via participating in the military, working in jobs that manage this imperial system (e.g. finance, defense, etc.), selecting the american candidates that pursue their favorite imperialist policies (i.e the policies that give them a larger share of the super profits). in turn, the domestic capitalists in america need the support of the americans, so they and the americans come to an agreement on how to divide the superprofits from the factories abroad among them

so, in the broader sense of imperialism, it seems to me that american capitalists and the group of average americans share ownership in the means of production, in a primary sense. but is there something wrong in this reasoning?

I'm glad there's a lot communist content on YouTube which I feel can get marxist thought a lot of visibility, but for me the YouTube UI feels like it's sometimes constantly bombarding me to click on things or scroll to the comments and it's a bit distracting sometimes... I definitely prefer the far more focused experience of reading theory instead

but there are also a lot of realllly good first-hand video sources on YouTube, not necessarily breadtube, that can be super fun to watch. one that comes to mind is "An African-American's Journal Inside North Korea (1994)", even though not all of the thoughts voiced in it are explicitly marxist. that one made a pretty big impression on me when I watched it for the first time :D

this is really inspiring actually! I've been thinking about coming out irl to more people than just some very close friends, it's nice to hear someone else's experience since it's so nervewracking to think about while other aspects of my life are so busy... sometimes I'm like, maybe I shouldn't do this, is there any point, surely I can manage living as a guy towards the public for the rest of my life if I've already done it for so long. but then of course, every instance of gender euphoria keeps changing my opinion... :D

Hi!! Yes it's been a great experience :D

Ah I see, yeah moving to a city seems like something you are heavily considering trying out, so I really hope you're able to figure something out in terms of passports and transportation and things. it's a worthwhile pursuit for sure

Oh wait, I didn't realize messages were a thing on lemmygrad! I'll head out for now, but I'll send a message later today when I'm free to talk again :)

Yeah it's really unfortunate that exposure therapy requires risking the resulting intense (potentially traumatic) discomfort....

Ahh I see. Yeah going to a city seems like it'd definitely give you more opportunity/flexibility to change your current situation, definitely seems like a reasonable option to consider

Absolutely, I guess the first thing I'd ask is, is there anything specific about it that you'd want to talk about? Also, have you looked into ERP (exposure and response prevention)?

In either case, maybe some of the following is relatable: assuming we have the same theme, I think one smaller compulsion I had was looking away from the TV/computer/phone whenever an advertisement or show or something had the target of the theme. So one thing that my therapist told me to do at the time was to resist the compulsion to turn my head away. Other (more difficult to tackle) compulsions included me moving really far away from said type of person (off my natural walking trajectory). I try to continue to walk in the direction I was walking as much as possible to counter this. I'm not completely out of the woods yet with this theme, but I think tackling many of my compulsions like this and other examples helped a bit.

Unfortunately I'm too young (college-age) to feel confident giving you any long-term advice... although actually I read your post earlier about direction in life, in which I saw you mentioned OCD, which I also suffer from, and we might even have the same theme based on your description. so if you feel comfortable talking about that/have anything you want to talk with me regarding that I can say my thoughts on it, don't feel pressured at all to talk about it though (I didn't bring it up earlier since I was worried as to whether you'd want to talk about it or not)

But yeah, I'm also in the process of thinking about my life trajectory so I hesitate to really give advice on that front, since I think my thoughts on life goals might drastically change as the next few years go on (depending on how things go in America as well)

Yeah, the pressures of college are horrible when dealing with mental health issues that make deadlines super stressful (like I feel like college just doesn't give people space to take days off (much less hours off) and really confront their struggles and direction in life, it's just a constant stream of work and other pressures)

The factory work/local work is a cool choice! one of my friends was talking about doing something like that as well and I've definitely had that option in mind as well

Yeah, I also live in America it's really bad... and thinking about all of the complicity of working in any American company is really rough. I'm curious, are there other kinds of companies you'd be fine working at? Personally my plan is to continue with a research/academic route, so that's also an option (although within academics there's a lot of suspicious ties with defense and Israel and stuff so it's rough to even find something fulfilling in academia)

Yayyy hope you enjoy the read!

Thanks!! I'm finding it super comfy already, I'm really happy that the community is so welcoming, really heartwarming :D