It’s great to see you reading! One thing I do want to point out, though, Principles of Communism is more of an FAQ than a developed and principled response to each question. It’s helpful for getting terms straight, but can also lead to people like yourself reading more into each line than is likely intended. I’ll respond to 16 and 24.

Re: 16, the question of reform or revolution, and the theory of the State. Revolution, in the Marxist sense, does not mean killing everyone that would oppose you, even the bourgeoisie. Revolution requires overthrowing the State, and replacing it with one that is comprehensively for the workers. It does not mean forming a small band of warriors to go and kill grandma for renting out a house so she can retire, it means guiding the revolution that will redistribute land while providing safety nets that make it so that grandma doesn’t need to be a landlord to survive.

When Communists and Socialists say “violence is necessary,” they mean that never in history has a ruling class given up power without force. The fun thing about the ruling class, though, is that it’s small. It can only rely on the state to do its bidding and fight, it cannot fight by itself. Jeff Bezos is not going to grab a rifle and fight a glorious war. What’s interesting about various Socialist revolutions, like in Russia, frequently the army stands down. The reason for this is that revolution isn’t something you can just do, it happens when the overwhelming majority of the population (total, not just the proletariat, though these are often very similar numbers as the proletariat outnumbers every other class in most nations), and the army frequently stands down in mass.

There are violent and lengthy revolutions, such as the Chinese revolution. This one was a long and bloody fight against colonialism, and then against a nationalist dictatorship. The people, however, supported the Communists, which is why they won. Cuba was an example of a mid-length revolution. There was a revolutionary war, but similar to Russia, the army did not fight very hard as they were in it for money, while the campesinos and beardos were in it for a better world.

There are also dogmatic, anti-Marxist “Marxists,” like the Shining Path in Peru under Gonzalo. They are little more than a band of murderous thugs that think “class struggle” means killing villagers that don’t agree, or randomly assassinating politicians instead of building up a mass movement. These are the people you are referring to as your fear, and they do exist, but are in an incredible minority globally.

I recommend reading Reform or Revolution by Rosa Luxemburg and Lenin’s The State and Revolution for why revolution is necessary. Entirely peaceful methods have been tried, like Allende in Chile, and they get overthrown by the bourgeoisie against the people, along with the US.

Re: question 24. Revolution does not happen without a broad, mass, organized movement. If that movement does not exist, there will be no revolution. When Engels says these reactionary types must be opposed, he means so ideologically, so that when a revolution does happen, the revolution will take a correct character. It does not mean killing everyone that disagrees, it means you must thoroughly debunk and discredit incorrect viewpoints, and if they engage violently (as the SPD did against the KPD in Germany, or some of the reactionary “left” groups in Russia during the Russian Civil War), defend yourself if you must.

As for as distinguishing between Proletarian and Petty Bourgeois, it’s not necessary at the individual level. Marxism is not a moral judgement, but an analysis of how classes behave in society. It doesn’t mean killing the petite bourgeoisie, it means working towards abolishing the foundations of the petite bourgeoisie through collectivization at the degree to which production has developed. Make sense? You’d keep your head, unless you decided to take up arms against a popular revolution and gave the people no other choice. Marxism isn’t about collectivizing through killing the owners, but through siezing the state and weilding its power to gradually fold more production into the public sector. You can’t kill a farm into a collectivized industrial farm, you have to develop out of small ownership.

When people say “kill the landlords” online, they are usually expressing frustration at the parasitic nature of landlordism, they are not announcing that they intend to kill grandma. I really want to stress this, the Marxist goal is not to achieve classless society by killing owners. Rather, the Marxist position is that you can’t achieve classless society that way, as each level of development best coincides with different forms of ownership, and it is highly developed industry that can best be publicly owned and planned.

As for Capital, I actually recommend staying away from it until you get some more of the basics of theory under your belt. You’ll notice its absence from my intro reading list, it’s an advanced text! It’s certainly a critical read, but if you want to get into the economic side, I recommend Wage Labor and Capital and Wages, Price, and Profit. Both combined are very short compared to even a single volume of Capital’s 3. However, I won’t stop you if you’ve decided to dive into the deep end! I just think you’ll understand it better if you are more familiar with Dialectical Materialism and Scientific Socialism first.

Glad you’re reading, feel free to ask more questions! If you want to ask questions, the Marxism comm on Hexbear is a good spot, or Ask Lemmygrad on Grad, or the Socialism and Communism communities on Lemmy.ml.