depends on what you mean. the principles which guide my morals only change when presented with significant reason to. i identify as a leftist in the political sense because it is where my beliefs closely align. communism doesn’t own the ideas central to my beliefs, and as i learn more about what it means to be a communist and how that group defines itself, i may find myself at odds with their overall interpretation and implementation of leftism.

i used to call myself a communist and now i don’t. i wouldn’t say ive become “less” of anything that i previously was when i wore the communist label. one reason i stopped is i simply don’t feel it appropriate to refer to myself as a commie because i don’t put much weight behind what Marx or Engels said in the 1800s as a person living in 2025 and i noticed a lot of modern communists live and breathe for their philosophical analysis.

but im still the leftist i was prior. if anything i have gotten further left since 2016 lol.

I don’t really feel that myself personally. Like some have said, probably the initial revolutionary vibe is wearing off? everyday when i go to work, read the news, or just exist in society, i become more communist and resolved everyday. perhaps you need to do more study and self-reflection.

If your material conditions aren’t basically forcing you to always try and find a way out (when you’ve already gained the beginnings of communist consciousness), you might just be struggling with the fact that your own life isn’t really that bad, and slipping into old habits.

Keep reading Marxist theory and developing your class consciousness and killing the little bourgeois-self in your head trying to commandeer your brain.

I think you might be getting out of the honeymoon phase of your discovery of Marxism-Leninism.

How so? Can you give more details about what you mean here?

In my case, I can feel that way by realizing that there’s not much praxis in real life I can do where I am as I am.

I think it’s normal to have doubts. I feel the need not to think about it too much. I also need to remind myself it’s not a perfect system.

I feel that way a lot recently because I’ve fallen out of doing stuff with my local org, but truth be told I spend almost all of my time working these days and I don’t know when I could do something with an org again.

Bro I barely feel like a person.

Are there any better explanations than materialist dialectical views on history and politics?

Communism is a science based on certain views of history, economics and other fields. It’s not a religious faith or personal opinions. Those are based on nothing and can be changed by anything.

Have you read combat liberalism

Weirdly enough, I feel less tankie when I have time off from work. I think my mentality becomes a bit bourgeois.

Then I go back to work, and I feel

I think doubting how communist you are is a good sign if you are living in a western nation. The more anti-imperialist theory I read the more I see that I am part of the problem. I’m a beneficiary of imperialism and I’m not willing to risk my freedom to oppose the status quo which means I am kind of a hypocrite.

I do a little agitation but I can’t really throw my life into anything to further communism and that makes me feel like a bit of a fraud. I can try to justify things by saying the chances of a revolution where I am are nil at the moment or that most orgs are riddled with revisionaries and feds so they are a waste of effort but that’s just excuses.

Imposter syndrome is a difficult feeling but but I’d rather continue to feel like a shitty communist than to try to pretend liberalism is anything but crypto-fascism.

every day I become more Maoist

Personally, I frequently doubt if I truly am understanding Marxism correctly, so I go into research spirals to see if I have a genuine understanding. Sometimes someone who obviously hasn’t read Marx, Engels, Lenin etc will come and accuse me of not understanding Marxism which can easily be countered, but frequently on the flip side I still harbor self-doubt.

I wouldn’t say I become less radical, but less confident, which pushes me into further reading and study.

All the time. I’m only barely picking up reading theory again and have done only a microscopic amount of organizing since becoming radicalized. I like to tell myself I don’t have the spoons, but I fear in reality that it’s because I’m unwilling to leave my suburban home to go to the city where the organizing is done and don’t want to alienate friends and family with moderate to heavy suburban kkkrakkker burger brainworms.