A lot of libertarians respect Marx. In general, he had a good understanding of the problems of a capitalist society and bad solutions to those problems.
If you are talking about his vision and insights, like oscilloscope, you get respect. If you espouse socialism, you don't.
You must talk to different libertarians than I. Most of them haven't read him.
Marx actually did not espouse 'socialism.' He referred to an 'lower stage of communism,' and was incredibly critical of the utopian socialists of his time.
Sorry but communism is badly flawed in its very design. It discourages hard working people and encourages lazy people by its very core philosophy. Nobody who is hard working will ever have an incentive when told he and the guy sitting next to him will get the same reward. And no lazy guy will ever work if he is told, regardless he will get the same as the guy who works hard.
People in capitalists countries by and large are over a degree of measure living in better conditions than those living in communist countries.
And people messing up their financial lives by reckless borrowing, debt and bad decisions[like taking loans to study humanities] is not the fault of capitalism.
The problem with Marx, for me, is that he relied on the growth of industry to create an abundance of wealth that would satisfy everyone's needs, but he did not take into account that some resources are not material in nature, such as time and social status. Capitalism can quantify abstracts into material representations (money -> time and social status), whereas Marx had no way, as far as I'm aware, of creating an abundance of intangible satisfactions. In fact, that may be impossible where the desires are hierarchical in nature, since there can never be an abundance of top performers due to the relative nature of the rankings.
Among other things, yes. That's just a slogan, but it's based in the rest of Marx's theories, obviously.
> but he did not take into account that some resources are not material in nature, such as time and social status.
These things would factor into the 'socially necessary' aspect of 'socially necessary labor time,' I'd imagine, but what I will say is that thinkers who have built on top of Marx absolutely address these issues. Debord, for example, with his 'society of the spectacle,' which specifically address social status (see aphorisms 60 and 61) and time (the entirety of part 5).
I don't have to read more. I have been through a communist set up myself(India), And I don't want to try. You can bring it in your country and enjoy it as much as you want. As far as I'm concerned I am glad my country is rapidly getting rid of last vestiges of communist policies we have.
Now coming to your point. Contrary to whatever you have 'read'(looks like all you have done is 'read' about it), or whatever you will read, the ground reality faced by people under a communist regime is vastly more different. No progress is ever allowed to happen under the name of 'protecting the poor', whatever progress you would have seen in a country like India is only because of some competitive pressure, our immediate neighbors have posed. It was very common in my country pre-1990's free market reforms to see the best hard working talent leave. There was no individual incentive to do anything special. And the environment(movies, media, drama shows, stories you name it) depicted rich as some form of evil entity bent destroying humanity. Even today the states ruled by communist governments(West Bengal and Kerala) see the largest group of youth moving out of those state to work in cities like Bangalore. The conditions are so horrible, there are bandhs, strikes, shutdowns by unions and communist groups ever other day. No productive work ever happens. Investors are shit scared to invest or set up any long term ventures in those states. And by and large in the name of protecting poor, the poor are always ensured they remain poor.
You will not believe the height of problems communist policies had caused in India. Around late 80's we had nation wide strikes when our Prime minister announced computers will be introduced in the country. That is the degree to which progress was blocked by communist groups. Even today we continue to see pockets of communist feelings around. A national policy on foreign direct investment in retail sector is being blocked and opposed currently.
Go to any communist nation you want. And see for yourself the kind of miserable conditions communist policies have bought upon those people.
Just in case you didn't know in India there is a terrorist groups based on principles of communism called 'maoists', which is by far considered biggest threat to internal security of our country.
> I have been through a communist set up myself(India)
Which period of India would you consider communist? The 'late 80s' period you reference later? I don't know nearly enough about India's history, and understand that geographic regions are very important.
> the ground reality faced by people under a communist regime is vastly more different.
Just like the reality on the ground in a capitalist country is very, very different than what the theory says. How many Native Americans did my country kill again? How many dead children are in Iraq and Afghanistan? Why do we have more empty houses than we do homeless people?
No social system is a magical cure.
> And see for yourself the kind of miserable conditions communist policies have bought upon those people.
You will not see me apologize for Stalin, for example, but what I will say is that Russia went from an agrarian nation to putting a man in space and becoming the #2 world superpower in what, 75 years? That's pretty damn impressive. The soviet experiment failed for good reasons, though.
> Just in case you didn't know in India there is a terrorist groups based on principles of communism called 'maoists', which is by far considered biggest threat to internal security of our country.
>>Which period of India would you consider communist? The 'late 80s' period you reference later? I don't know nearly enough about India's history, and understand that geographic regions are very important.
India never explicitly stated its a communist country. But most of its policies were communist based for a large part of its post independent history. State controlled industries, tightly regimented license system for anything private, unions etc.
Marx theory is really deeply flawed, because he regards masses as controlling units of society. But in real world, who controls masses? Some individuals because masses can not decide for themselves without individuals deciding for themselves. The idea of masses act as single unity without influence of only few gifted individuals does not stand.
And it's utopia to think that gifted individuals are always nice people, which reality proved many times.
You have very serious misconceptions about Marxism.
> The idea of masses act as single unity without influence of only few gifted individuals does not stand.
This is not true.
> And it's utopia to think that gifted individuals are always nice people, which reality proved many times.
Marxism does not make ethical assertions about people and their actions. Marx takes great pains in Capital to divorce his theories from ethics, though occasionally he uses some metaphors that imply a personal ethics.
No, fortunately I don't. The concept of masses as ruling body is flawed because individuals constituted masses and masses are moved by only few individuals at the end as was proved by history and as it was objected before it was taken seriously. It's a naive concept. Tell me, how in the real world does masses actually decide correctly without being first constituted by rational individuals? And if you put individual before masses, you are not talking about Marxism.
If you are talking about his vision and insights, like oscilloscope, you get respect. If you espouse socialism, you don't.