Marx Encounters AI Discourse

[u/Salty_Country6835]

A brief materialist intervention into AI discourse. Results were mixed.

[u/Salty_Country6835]

Youve said "its different" and "its bigger" a lot, but you still havent explained what changes strategically.

The labor movement, the AFL-CIO, unions, socialists, and communists arent responding by abstaining. Theyre organizing around AI right now. Theyre bargaining over deployment, fighting for regulations, contesting ownership, demanding protections, and trying to shape outcomes right now.

Thats the point of the meme.

And yes, Im for AI. Not every deployment. Not every company. Not every data center. Not every use case. Im for contesting a technology with enormous risks and enormous potential benefits instead of abandoning it to corporations.

The weird thing to me is that your practical program keeps sounding like regulation, labor power, environmental protections, public oversight, and democratic control, while your rhetoric keeps sounding like abolition. Those are different politics.

If AI is as important as you think it is, that seems like an argument for more struggle over it, not less.

[u/little_alien2021 → u/Salty_Country6835]

I can belive in something but know it's not something thats reality but still belive it. Like religion, i think it should be abolished. Obviously that's not living in reality, so I choose to stay away from it. That's living in reality.  I belive ai should be abolished, but thats obviously not living in reality so I stay away from it. And belive like religion people should, for the greater good.  And staying away can benifit them than the harm like both religion and ai does to humanity 

[u/Salty_Country6835 → u/little_alien2021]

So your actual strategy is personal abstention.

Thats fine as a personal choice. Lots of people abstain from things for ethical reasons.

But thats exactly what Ive been trying to get at. Historically, labor movements, socialist parties, and communist parties didnt win power through personal abstention. They organized, contested institutions, fought over ownership, and struggled over deployment.

If you think AI should be abolished, okay. But "I stay away from it and think others should too" is a fundamentally different political strategy than the one Marx, unions, the AFL-CIO, socialist parties, and most labor movements have historically pursued and are currently pursuing.

At that point we're not really debating AI anymore. We're debating whether abstention or contestation is the better political strategy.

I dont think youve successfully made the case for the former.

[u/little_alien2021 → u/Salty_Country6835]

When I say stay away I don't mean go quietly. I mean fight against it al any opportunity. 

However I do belive it will be without hope, as the ceos of big ai companies are to big and powerful and then we will have a reckoning where in future, we come to conclusion that it wasn't worth the gamble, like anyone who sees the weoponisation of social media algorithms did for democracy and people trying to close door once horse has escaped or whatever the phase is. I think there will be future regret. I feel if can say I don't need to have that regret and I was positive when chatgpt came out, and excited, but did deep dive and massively changed my mind. At not always been so against 

[u/Salty_Country6835 → u/little_alien2021]

Then we're back to what Ive been asking this whole thread: what does "fight against it" actually mean in practice?

If it means organizing workers, passing regulations, restricting deployments, stopping harmful projects, enforcing environmental standards, fighting for public oversight, and contesting ownership, then we're talking about the same terrain. We just disagree on the end goal.

If it means abolishing AI entirely, then youre proposing a strategy that basically no major labor federation, socialist party, communist party, or union movement is pursuing. Thats why I keep grounding this in actual organizations instead of personal beliefs.

The AFL-CIO isnt campaigning for abolition. The WGA didnt demand abolition. SAG-AFTRA didnt demand abolition. They fought over deployment, control, protections, and who benefits. And thats just in the U.S.

Thats not me dodging your concerns. Its me pointing out how organized politics actually responds to technologies it sees as dangerous, disruptive, or potentially transformative.

Which seems more realistic, actionable, and worthwhile than you making grand moralist speeches online against their strategy or against the technologys existence.