late marx - could someone explain this stage of marx's think

[red head]

i've heard marx became a diehard authoritarian near the end of his life. it really interests me how someone who started out with such democratic, humanistic ideas could become authoritative and reactionary. could anyone explain his thinking during this phase and recommend any books that he wrote during this time?

[ArgueEverything]

i wouldnt say he became a diehard authoritarian. i think there was just a paradigm shift in his thinking. when he was younger he was more philosophical, and attacked religion etc. when he was older(and more knowledgeable) he focused more on the economy of capitalism.

the beauty of marx is that he never told us how a communist state should be run. therefore he cant really be called authoritarian.

perhaps by authoritarian you mean his hatred for the bourgeosie became greater. yeah, thats probably true, george bernard shaw said he sounded like a correspondent for a class war. but it was, and still is, a highly influential text, like most of his stuff.

oh, another thing. marx was a rabid anti-semite when he was young. he wrote probably the worst diatribe of jews in the 19th century, saying their whole religion revolved around money. he changed his opinions when he got older though, and became friendly with a few rabbis. that shows he bcame more humanistic as he got older, in some respects.

[Karo Chevez]

Its odd to consider Marx as being anti-Semitic seeing how he was himself of Jewish origin,but in the aspect
of religion he was an opponent of Judaism,Christianity,
and religion in general and he held that Jews bowed
before the money-god,a practice that is very evident
among Christians with their lavish churches and pleas
for contributions by which they live in spender while the
poor devotees scamble about working and saving in order to send funds on the promise of lying preachers
that their gift will return to them ten-fold,therefore the
poor themselves indirectly take part in the worship of
the money-god by their devotion to greed and the hope
that they likewise may be blessed insomuch that they
too can flaunt their long-awaited riches in the arrogant
manner as displayed by wealthy evangelists.Motivation
for wealth has permeated every fiber of modern society
and continues to be the all-existent principle for life for
which man would gladly betray his family and friends in
pursuit of that monetary deity whose blessings bestow
the opportunity to live in opulence while his fellowman
is forced to live in poverty and made to envy those who
possess a status they themselves will never attain.-Karo

[peaccenicked]

People who talk about the 'late' Marx deny the real
continuity in Marx's work. The early work informs the later and vice versa. He was not as such an authoritarian as respecter of genuine authourity like that
of a worker who knows his job. He would never stop a train driver and tell him how to do his job. He did not hate Jews only theirs and all other brain glogging religion. His works should be studied as a whole.