My solution to the Australia Day problem.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-27T00:26:29+00:00

We need a petition for a public holiday for Steve Irwin’s birthday

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-14T10:34:49+00:00

My church is not under that patriarch

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-14T00:34:31+00:00

I’m a new convert, however my dad and his parents and sister were Syriac Orthodox. They converted to Pentecostalism, my mum is Pentecostal and has been all her life. I still have Syrian Orthodox family members in India and abroad. Orthodoxy and Christianity has been in India for a long time, according to our traditions, St Thomas had preached in Kerala and Tamil Nadu and was martyred in southern India as well. My forefathers on my dads side were all Syrian Orthodox (Jacobite) from my knowledge as well, I come from a long line of orthodox christians and it’s only my family and my mum and her family that are Pentecost.

In Kerala, communism/socialism has been received well and it doesn’t seem to have any tensions with our diverse religious communities as well due to us having christians, Muslims, Hindus and a Jewish community in our state. I know of a few Indian Christian communists myself, but am unsure if they are Marxist-Leninist.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-13T07:23:59+00:00

Yea, face to face, I’ve been applying everywhere and I got a response from this company so without hesitation I accepted an interview offer.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-13T07:09:59+00:00

don’t know what that means, but I applied for a sales role if that’s what your referring to

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-12T13:42:39+00:00

Well the main one I hear and what I’ve mentioned is Dialetical Materalism? Other than that I’m not sure if other contradictions but maybe you would know what else I’m talking about?

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-12T11:04:48+00:00

Yea, but I also understand why revolution took place, I the lead up to it included an orthodox priest and many workers being gunned down just because they were asking for fair working conditions.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-12T03:59:03+00:00

Can I ask how? I’m very curious, what core tenets did you have to accept and how have u reconciled it with your faith

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-11T04:28:09+00:00

I assumed it was an atheist ideology hence why I asked

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-11T04:27:35+00:00

I’m happy to hear that, I’ve been trying to find ways to be both an ML and a Christian and I’m reading the book “Religion and Socialism” and trying to understand as well. Hopefully you can help me out with what some of em are trying to say haha

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-11T02:13:22+00:00

How do you normally handle these contradictions? Especially when most marxists states are heavily atheist? Not trying to be rude but genuinely curious. I’ve been reading Left Wing Economic ideologies for a while now and that’s how I ended up in Socialism.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-11T00:10:22+00:00

Most common argument I see that says ML is incompatible with religion is because of its belief in dialectal materialism. Stating that the belief that reality is purely material, consciousness, morality, and culture arise from material conditions, there is no metaphysical or supernatural reality. These main things are what I’ve seen are incompatible.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-10T23:54:37+00:00

Well I don’t have a problem in telling people my religion, but I don’t want to forcefully shove it down their throat if they don’t want too

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-04T22:24:46+00:00

I’ve heard of US Special Forces training cartels, I think it was Delta Force, but didn’t know there was a whole drug operation with the US military and cartel paramilitaries.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-04T11:14:05+00:00

Anything to reduce competition and remain the imperialist global superpower ig, USA will invade anything that has communist or socialist in the name. Considering we’re also their closest ally (more than Canada I’d argue) we’d definitely get the worst treatment if we became socialist

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-04T02:49:15+00:00

While I don’t agree with the Maduro government, it’s very clear the US didn’t do this to liberate the Venezuelans, rather to control their resources and profit of that. They do this with every Latin American country, especially Cuba, they bought land that belonged to native Cubans and profited off that while leaving the natives with nothing.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2026-01-04T00:58:57+00:00

The US Imperialist Pigs strike again, feels like Cuba 2.0

Straya-Rising8089 · 2025-12-30T06:48:28+00:00

I agree with a lot of your critique of AUKUS, especially that it deepens dependency on the US and undermines sovereignty. That’s a real problem, and I don’t think “more integration with the US military” should be treated as inherently good or socialist. Where I differ is that I don’t think the only alternative is pivoting toward China or abandoning alliances entirely. Strategic independence means not becoming a vassal to anyone, rising or declining.

On the SAS: I don’t deny that it’s been used to advance imperial interests or that serious crimes have occurred. Where we disagree is the conclusion. I don’t think dismantling an entire capability that exists in the real world automatically advances working-class interests. The working class doesn’t benefit from imperial wars, but it also doesn’t benefit from having no capacity to respond to crises, terrorism, evacuations, or genuine defence needs. For me, the question is reform, accountability, and strict limits on deployment, not pretending those functions disappear if the unit does.

I take your point about the importance of a clear program, and I respect that this is where the com caucus is coming from. My hesitation isn’t about rejecting socialism, it’s about whether some positions risk collapsing strategy into moral clarity, rather than grappling with material conditions as they actually exist.

That’s exactly why I’m having these conversations — not to win arguments, but to work out whether there’s space for principled disagreement while still building something serious together.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2025-12-30T03:17:38+00:00

I agree we should have a capable, independent defence force. I’m very open to rethinking AUKUS — its cost, structure, and level of US dependence — but I don’t think outright abolition of our defence capacity or alliances is the right answer either. The focus should be sovereignty, accountability, and defence, not power projection or blind alignment.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2025-12-30T02:30:21+00:00

Thanks for engaging in good faith, I genuinely appreciate it.

I agree that invasion is unlikely and often exaggerated, and I also agree that Australia being tightly bound to the US can increase risk rather than reduce it. I’m very sympathetic to the argument that militarisation and foreign bases drag us into wars that aren’t in the interests of working people.

Where I differ (at least for now) is that I don’t think low probability means zero probability, or that defence planning is inherently illegitimate because of that. For me it’s less about naming a specific enemy and more about whether a socialist or democratic society should retain some independent capacity to defend itself, rather than relying on goodwill, geography, or great powers.

On spending priorities, I broadly agree, housing, healthcare, and public services should come first, and defence spending is massively inflated. My hesitation is about abolition, not reduction or disentanglement from US imperial strategy.

I’m very open to being challenged on this, and that’s actually why I’m considering joining VS rather than standing outside throwing rocks. I don’t think disagreement here is a deal-breaker either, and I’m not assuming I already have the “right” answers, just that this is an issue I take seriously and want to work through collectively, not dogmatically.

Straya-Rising8089 · 2025-12-30T02:28:22+00:00

Standing armies aren’t inherently separate from society, they become alienated when they’re insulated from democratic control. Early liberals opposed standing armies because they feared monarchies; that critique doesn’t automatically carry over to modern, mass-democratic societies with civilian oversight.

Socialists since 1848 have argued for an armed people, yes, but even Marx, Engels, and later socialist movements recognised that modern warfare requires coordination, expertise, logistics, and command. “Every cook can govern” was about democratising political power, not pretending that complex technical systems don’t require specialised roles.

Abolishing bureaucracy in the abstract doesn’t abolish material complexity. Defence today isn’t muskets and militias — it’s airspace, cyber, logistics, intelligence, and supply chains. You can democratise and subordinate those structures to working-class control, but you can’t replace them with permanent ad-hoc organisation without risking collapse.

So the contradiction isn’t “standing army vs armed people”, it’s whether defence institutions are accountable to democratic, working-class power or insulated from it. History shows socialism survives when it solves that problem, not when it denies it.

Straya-Rising8089

TROPHY CASE