Open invitation to all commenters

Define Marxism. State what you believe to be the meaning of the term. Extra bonus points for any actual relevance to the writings of Karl Marx, and super duper bonus points if you provide any evidence of actually having read ten or more words he ever wrote. If you want to define Marxism in terms of Groucho Marx, that's okay too.

The challenge is straightforward. You must provide a definition of Marxism. Don't just tell me that so-and-so claims to be a Marxist and expect me to think that's a problem or understand why you think it is. I might just be thinking so what? Who gives a shit? As a matter of fact I am thinking that.

Okay, since nobody has stepped up to the challenge, I will say a bit about this. Karl Marx wrote several books which would serve very well as doorstops and an avalanche of shorter publications. Given the immensity and complexity of his oeuvre, and its immense influence over later sociological and political thought, there are many competing interpretations and later adaptations of his thinking. It so happens that some oppressive, tyrannical regimes that arose long after his death in 1883 claimed to be based on Marxist ideas, but he would have been appalled by that because he was a radical egalitarian. He did not believe that some people should have power over others and indeed it was his life's obsession to combat oppression and raise the living standards, political and social power, and lifeworld of poor and working people.

Given his vast output, that his ideas evolved somewhat over time, and that people disagree about what is most essential in Marx's thought, there can't be any one succinct definition. It is also the case that he was much more specific, detailed and testable in his critique of 19th Century capitalism than he was in imagining what should follow -- really what would follow because he saw certain historical developments as inevitable, and he was certainly wrong about that. But I would say that a few key ideas are most important.

First, he was what social scientists call a conflict theorist. Social science theories can very broadly speaking be placed in two categories, the other being functionalist theories. Functionalists try to explain social systems by referring to their supposed functions, i.e. their outputs are purported to meet certain needs. Put crudely, capitalism exists because it is an effective way of generating needed and wanted goods and services.

Conflict theorists perceive that there are groups in society that have competing interests and differential power. Feudal lords and kings exercised control over the peasantry by a monopoly of force -- well trained men with deadly weapons that peasants didn't have, who could force the serfs to live in misery and give much of their pittance to their overlords. Capitalists are for the most part not farmers (though a few still are) but similarly, they own the "means of production" and their ownership rights are enforced by the armed power of the state, over which they have disproportionate control. That's what Marx thought. He saw history as conflict among social classes, which in his day mostly meant workers and owners, although since his time a large professional and managerial class has emerged which somewhat complicates the picture.

Marx also argued that when workers have to survive by trading their labor for money, their bodies and souls become commodified, and their lives are unrewarding. (He called this the alienation of labor.) This is certainly true for many industrial workers, who spend their days doing mind-numbing repetitive tasks and are often treated disrespectfully. Again, the situation has become more complicated since his day but in fact recently the trend has been for people who had been independent artisans and small scale entrepreneurs to increasingly be "proletarianized," that is to become employees of large corporations. This is  even true of physicians.

He also argued for something called the labor theory of value, which most people nowadays think was a flawed idea. Prices depend on the relationship between how many people want something and how much they want it, and its scarcity. Labor is only one factor that goes into scarcity, although it certainly matters, and you can legitimately argue that capitalists are expropriating a part of workers' output to which they are legitimately entitled. But this still allows for immense differences in compensation among people who have skills in differential supply. (Note that the opportunity to acquire those skills is in large part inherited.) Whether you think this is just is not a factual question.

So, he argued that workers should be freed from their oppression by gaining ownership of the means of production. He wasn't very specific about how this would work, alas. The Bolsheviks and Mao Tse Tung claimed to seize the means of production on behalf of the proletariat, but it was all a fraud.

Most egalitarian thinkers nowadays thinks that while public ownership of some kinds of enterprises, such as utilities, would be workable an desirable, markets and some form of private ownership are the best way to achieve economic output that meets people's needs. However, markets and enterprise need to be regulated in the general interest, and wealth must be continually redistributed because it is an essential feature of unrestrained capitalism that it concentrates wealth increasingly in fewer hands. This is indeed happening over recent decades, as environmental degradation has created an existential crisis for humanity.

I personally feel that it is pointless to label oneself as a "Marxist," which can have a range of meanings, and completely ridiculous to engage in theological arguments about the true doctrine of Marxism, which unfortunately some people will do. However, if people want to call themselves Marxists I don't really care, I look at whatever it is they actually believe and the kinds of change they work to bring about. If they want to call themselves Btfsplk it's all the same to me.

PS: The Black Lives Matter protests are peaceful, inclusive, and committed to democratic process. But I certainly see that they feel threatening to people who want to cling to their white privilege.