It’s not really capitalism anymore when the government keeps bailing out businesses that are supposed to fail.
This happens when capital owners get enough wealth and influence to capture government regulatory agencies. This is what any attempt at capitalism will build to.
At least the no true communism people use the actual definition of the system in their argument. What you’re describing is literally capitalist organizations acting on the incentives inherent to the system.
You’re being ridiculous. Greed is the “inherent incentive” that leads to regulatory rapture under capitalism and authoritarianism under communism (which one could argue to be the same thing in essence).
The solution is a government of the people, for the people, a.k.a. democracy. Which can choose whichever economic system it damn well pleases, as long as it keeps greed in check through taxation, public services, strong welfare, social discourse, etc. Like social-democratic countries in Europe have been doing for decades. Or try a version of that for communism, I don’t care.
Even so, those countries in Europe are still capitalist. They’ve just tempered it with government policies that restrain it to adequate levels.
In that sense I suppose “this is the least worst system” isn’t technically true. Unbridled capitalism from the industrial revolution is incredibly different from restrained European capitalism after all.
I did not say, nor do I think, that capitalism is “the least worst system”. I’m sure we could do better in many regards, but that’s quite irrelevant to the point anyway.
America’s version of capitalism isn’t the only cannon version of capitalism (and I could write a whole-ass essay about how the current state of affairs in the US goes back decades, and is fundamentally unfixable due to the federal nature of the country with its urban/rural divide mixed in with Electoral College and FPTP voting essentially preventing any meaningful structural reform).
There’s no need to dismiss neoliberal social-democracy, just because it’s “different” from the mess that America got itself into. Europe’s achievements stand on their own, and America’s systemic failures being blamed on “muh capitalism” completely misses the point, and the actual root cause of the democratic back-sliding which is corrupting the system in favor of the elites.
I completely agree actually. Blaming it on capitalism is reductive and masks the actual root causes, and what sort of solutions we need.
And then when capitalists turn news into an entertainment business you’ll vote for their victory while thinking you’re a populist.
Your solution requires a fair playing field, especially with information and people with wealth and power will work to limit that info. Fox News and it’s ever expanding right wing influence sphere show how much money there is in convincing the average voter to vote to further empower the capital class.
You equate the two but I don’t think you actually understand the fundamental core of these ideas. In capitalism, gathering wealth is the basic core foundation of the system. The hierarchy is spelled out and requires a vast underclass who prop up the lifestyles of those on top with their labor. In communism, the fundamental idea is that hierarchy should be dismantled. The system that was initially labeled communism was described as stateless, classless, and moneyless.
Corrupt individuals can turn literally any government into authoritarianism if given the chance, that’s not inherent to communist ideology. Especially when you consider all the dictators the US has cozied up to for natural resources and such. When billionaires say “we coup who we want” you can’t single communism out for creating authoritarian institutions. It shows a lack of perspective.
Lol dude, this is what happens to virtually every major system. It’s just corruption, plain and simple.
Only if you sand off the details. The corruption here is directly incentivized as a way to become more successful in the system. Its incentivized to a much larger degree than any other system based on where power is derived from.
Yeah, ok sure.
Yeah it’s called corruption. I think no matter how perfect your ideals are in your head, any idea can be ruined with a little corruption.
Which is why every authoritarian system of government leads to disaster. The fewer people are at the top, the easier it is for that corruption to take hold.
i definitely agree, easy accumulation of power in any system will lead to authoritarianism.
without strong protections, capitalism will inevitably lead to a small number of people holding most of the money (and therefore, the power).
those trying to grow massive amounts of capital do not want competition, they do not want a “fair market”. they want monopoly and control and they have the money to bribe and pay their way into more of it.
they will leverage their money to their benefit and to the detriment of everyone else. this wouldn’t be as bad if wealth disparity wasn’t insane, but some people literally have the money to move mountains. they will buy competition just to kill it, they will lobby the government to reduce regulations on pollution and labor to lower their costs, they will pay politicians to change voting districts to make it ever harder to change the status quo, they will do whatever it takes to protect and grow their power. and in a system where money is power, their existing hoard of money all but guarantees their success.
this is also authoritarianism, just hidden by the veil of “the free market”.
I actually don’t disagree with anything you’ve said. Any one ideology will end up stagnating. We see that totally free market is a mess and creates its own ruling class with its own form of oppression. Personally I think we need a flavor of capitalism where the rules that are supposed to prevent monopolies are actually enforced. Make FTC do it’s job. No bailouts, no lobbying, strict rules about campaign financing. Add universal healthcare and term limits for every government position and I think we’d be golden. We would need to keep an eye on regulatory capture.
It doesn’t have to be all or nothing capitalism or socialism.
Libya was doing pretty well under Gaddafi… it’s much worse in every way now that there is more than one dude at the top lmao
I wouldn’t say “pretty well” unless you add “relative to now”
Hum… wouldn’t you like to live in a country that when you turn 18 you win a brand new car from the government? A free house? Don’t have to pay any bills? Free higher education? And after graduating if you can’t find a job the government gave you an average salary every month until you did find one? If you needed medical treatment that wasn’t available in your country, your government flew you to and paid for your treatment wherever it was available?
What the fuck bullshit propaganda are you spreading rofl
Fucking tankies are hilarious
Sure, Libya was a paradise and the giant crowds of people who ass raped Gaddafi to death with a bayonet were all CIA plants
Gaddafi wasn’t a socialist or communist at all. I’m not a tankie either.
And man, I know it’s hard to believe, but all that I said is true. Libya has a shit ton of oil and minerals. Instead of having a corporation profit off of it, the state owned all of it and there was a very strong wealth distribution system.
But Gaddafi was crazy. And he clamped hard on religious extremists. Which yes we’re trained by the US to coup him. Y’know, as Hilary said “we came we saw he died?”…
Or you really think the Libyan “revolution” was completely natural and grassroots? Lmao
That’s how capitalism has always worked in practice, though.
Well it’s an interesting idea on paper anyway
Of course it is. Capitalism, especially neoliberal capitalism, needs the state to support it. Without the state, who will arrest people who go against the wishes of capital? If there isn’t one already, capital will become the state.
it is when the richest people have already paid off the government to bail them out, when the time comes, with our tax dollars.
The system wouldn’t work without bailouts. It’s a feature, not a bug.
neoliberal governance is an extension of capitalism, change my mind.
That is indeed still capitalism
No, that is corporate socialism.
Socialism is not when the government does things.
Its not? Every definition of socialism I’ve ever heard of is exactly that.
For instance:
“Socialism is, broadly speaking, a political and economic system in which property and the means of production are owned in common, typically controlled by the state or government.”
What’s your definition?
That is not what those words mean.
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Do you want the explanation?
Capitalism isn’t the “best system we’ve got”, though… it isn’t even the system we are all using right now.
We’ve never operated in anything like a “purely” capitalist economy, and the socialist policies most western countries have put in place are wildly popular and few people would want to live without them.
Countries that intelligently choose when and where and what things should be operated on a capitalist basis, have better outcomes.
Healthcare? Not something anyone should make money off of. Basic housing, food, water, power… these should be immune to market forces.
At the same time, capitalism drives fantastic technological and social innovation within its swimlane. We just have to pre-define what things people should be able to make money doing.
Capitalism =/= markets.
Socialism =/= public services.
Markets are much older than capitalism, and socialism is a very simple economic idea, being the collective ownership of the means of production by the workers.
Capitalism guides innovation towards increasing profits for capitalist, hardly “innovative”. The USSR was the first to the Moon, after being a feudalistic society, thanks to socialism.
Imean, the USSR wasn’t even good socialism. They still used money for quite a large set of things, businesses were very much NOT worker owned in many places, people could be killed by the whims of authorities and a dictator… Yep, not even good socialism got to space first.
I mean, not having money is a communism thing, not socialism.
But most businesses in the USSR were co-ops or state-owned.
I’m not in the “the dictatorship of the proletariat is identical to collective ownership” camp, but I mean, that is in the end a difference of ideology regarding what socialism really is.
And…. What dictator? I mean, all that “there’s no freedom in the USSR, if Stalin thinks you’re ugly you go to the gulag” is 100% propaganda, right? I mean the CIA admitted in their secret reports that not even Stalin was really a dictator, but that disclosing that wouldn’t be politically favourable to the US.
And like… I don’t think the USSR killed anymore people than the US or Europe lmao
State owned is EXACTLY NOT “worker owned”.
What dictator? As if people couldn’t or weren’t put to death at Stalin’s word over simole paranoia??
I would agree, but many socialists wouldn’t.
And man… please don’t come with this Stalin bullshit. If you really think he was “le big evil gulag no food man”, please for the love of god read a bit more, from non Empire-propaganda sources.
I say this strongly as a non-communist (in the USSR sense).
I don’t have any “labels” like that but I more strongly align with anarchism. I also believed Stalin, Mao, Lenin etc were big evil men. But bro, 90% of it really, truly, is propaganda.
Lol, you say that but… Guess you started the gulag system? You guessed it, Lenin! Who brought it to it’s apex? Staline! Does it continue to this day? Yes!
Here’s another great example of Stalins legacy:
The Road of Bones
“The Dalstroy construction directorate built the Kolyma Highway during the Soviet Union’s Stalinist era. Inmates of the Sevvostlag labour camp started the first stretch in 1932, and construction continued with the use of gulag labour until 1953.”
“The road is treated as a memorial by some, as the bones of the estimated 250,000–1,000,000 imprisoned laborers[3] who died while constructing it were allegedly laid beneath or around the road, although documented sources have yet to confirm this through further evidence”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R504_Kolyma_Highway
This article has pictures:
“Prisoners spent 20 years building the road, from 1932 to 1952, and after that the camp was closed. According to official data, there were roughly 700 thousand prisoners working in this Gulag branch during these years, peaking in 1940, when 190 thousand men worked there in mining and construction works. It’s estimated that more than 125 thousand people perished during the camp’s existence.”
Side note: we have a family friend who had half of his family sent to the Soviet gulags in the 1950s. Most of them died there. He’s Polish.
Hum… and? Outside of the propaganda, yea gulags and? I don’t see the point.
Are you saying prisons are bad? I agree, I’m fully a prison abolitionist. But I don’t see how saying “look prisons!” is any argument against the USSR in particular.
Prisons have existed for a long time everywhere. And many times and in many places were much worse than the gulags.
Just keep in mind that again, 90% of what you read on gulags is literal Cold War and Nazi propaganda…
“there’s no freedom in the USSR, if Stalin thinks you’re ugly you go to the gulag” is 100% propaganda, right?
Sure buddy. That was just a psyop that the MAN wants us to believe so we don’t revolt and bring back communism.
Oh no, I’m brainwashed! Lmao
Sure buddy. Go back to believing everything your school textbooks and journalists on TV have been saying since the Cold War.
We can appreciate the achievements of the USSR and still accept its failures
And I do do that. But any discussion or discourse on this is muddled with Nazi propaganda talking points, and it’s impossible to truly praise and truly critique the USSR without people calling you a “tankie”…
You’re almost there buddy.
I think I’m already there friendo.
I wonder if those accomplishments were meant to happen if they hadn’t had an ideological enemy in the ‘capitalist west’.
Your point isn’t completely invalid, but it’s a circular argument. Whatever the external force was, the system had the ability to complete the objective.
One could actually argue that sending a person to the moon didn’t directly achieve anything for the people, so that wouldn’t necessarily have been a goal by itself anyway and was a waste of resources.
What’s the point? If there was no space race the USSR would likely just invest even harder on cybernetics and information technology, as they were also pioneers in these areas, for example.
The Soviet Unions industrial development was ironically funded by American capitalists during the 1920s through the 1940s. Without that massive influx of knowledge, technical expertise and capital, the Soviet Union would never have industrialized at the rate that it did. It might not even have succeeded. However, I am not an expert in Soviet history either.
Albert Khan was a American industrial architect who was responsible for designing and building American car, tractor and other factories for heavy industrial equipment in the United States. Starting in the 1920s, he traveled to the Soviet Union and designed and lead co instruction of ~500 massive state-run industrial plants using American equipment and machines. This is also similar to how Japan industrialized following the end of the Tokugawa shogunate during the Japanese civil War.
“When “the architect of Ford,” Albert Kahn, designed the River Rouge complex outside Detroit in 1917, Calder was one of the field engineers, but he had never worked on a project on the Soviet scale before. Everything from steel to skylights was coming from the U.S. by boat, special-built train, trucks, and, yes, camels. In barely a year’s time the factory would begin pumping out 50,000 tractors per year, operated by workers who lived across a strip of lawn in government apartment blocks that Calder was also building. Close to 400 U.S. workers were supervising the job, mostly from Detroit. Though their families shivered through the Russian winter in underheated homes, Calder and the rest of Kahn’s experts thrilled at the challenge. And there were 500 more factories to go.”
“Though the collaboration has been all but forgotten, evidence suggests that more than 1,200 U.S.-based architects, engineers, designers, and foremen seeded the Soviet industrial revolution. In just three years, they built upwards of 500 factories, trained more than 3,000 Soviet staff, and brought lessons back home that have yet to be fully understood.”
https://lsa.umich.edu/lsa/news-events/all-news/search-news/built-in-the-u-s-s-r---by-detroit-.html
No, you see, the only way to improve things is to wank endlessly about some grand revolution that will bring about a perfect utopia that we can’t even define much less implement. Using the tools we have available right now to make the world better just means that you’re a status-quo centri-fascist!
How do you feel about democracy in the workplace, though?
It makes sense if it’s intelligently constructed and clearly defined.
Totally agree. Capitalism is an amazing tool that allows corporations and nation states to leverage capital to tackle major projects, like infrastructure and technology development.
The capitalism at its end state is a rent-seeking endeavor that destroys and consumes its own market creations.
Therefore, it seems the best of both worlds is to allow capitalism to operate in a sandbox, while providing socialism in the form of universal health care, education and infrastructure to everyone else. Let the rich get rich, but tax the wealth at a certain point to prevent them from getting too rich and then redistribute that to bring the bottom 50% up to middle class standards.
That sounds pretty commie to me comrade.
The world has basically settled on mixed economies being the best possible system. The debate is now really about what the mix should be.
We’ve collectively decided healthcare should be public-owned, the US is just the one dissenting voice that hasn’t yet fully switched over yet. We’ve also decided that food production, distribution and sales should be largely capitalist, but with socialist supports for the production because food production is too essential to be allowed to fail completely. We’ve decided that research into medicine and drugs should have both private and public components, but that the government must investigate and regulate any new things, so we don’t get tricksters selling snake oil.
No society is seriously considering a fully socialist or fully capitalist system because it’s clear how badly they fail. But, disputes over just how much socialism is too much or too little will go on for a long time.
So you are saying I can’t build a house as I like it and then sell it? Nor can I invent some type of food, prepare it and sell it? Becuase only the government is allowed to do that?
You’re taking to the extreme. But you know what we see right now in the world? People dying of hunger or living on the streets because they’re not profitable. The situation they are in doesn’t produce enough capital. Honestly, fuck that. This should not be like this.
Child repeating what their parents and society has told them.
Vs.
Adult who has started to live the reality.
In theory, how would a different system really help?
Currently the people in power manipulate and circumvent the system, do they magically disappear?
The move from absolute monarchies ruled by kings and aristocrats to democracies made the power distribution more equal across classes.
What is needed in a new system is another step in this direction.
The biggest problem and driver of inequality in the current system is that while we have democratic control of government, the control of business is still largely autocratic.
Work and business is a huge part of our lives and making sure that the companies work for workers and consumers and not owners and investors is the next major systemic change that should be sought out.
Go join a coop 🥶. They work for workers and community
I’m saying that should be the norm.
I’m calling for systemic change. Individual people making choices to have democratic processes in their businesses is not enough.
You’re like a serf going “Go move to a republic 🥶.”
You’re like a serf going “Go move to a republic 🥶.”
Wait, what? A serf cannot move without the king’s permission. You, I, and everyone can make it a preference to join a co-op or union work place with every job move.
Are there many co-op positions available in my area and field? No. Unions? No.
Do I have a preference for them? Yes.
Maybe I will have to start one.One step at a time is better than no steps.
Sure, one step at a time is great. It’s just not a replacement for systemic change.
If you can unionize or start a co-op, do it! Any amount of worker power will help the overall cause.
Systemic change requires state violence as you have to convince the benefactors of capitalism to give up their property and powe. The only way to accomplish this state violence is with a bureaucracy and concentration of power. Tada: You created Stalinism. Again. Just like the last 20 times socialism was tried by big picture “revolutions”
I don’t think worker rebellions get you where you need, so come up with an alternate route.
I think the issue would be that currently it is not feasible for workers to start co-ops. Subsidies for worker co-ops would be a good option
That is a good suggestion.
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Vote with your money?
It seems your fellow voters has vote to shop at walmart
There is this belief by so many that somehow, if you create the perfect system, it will somehow overcome human nature or that humans will somehow starting acting collectively altruistic with the right political model.
In most cases, they also imagine themselves in a position of power in this new government, either up in an upper “leadership” class or somehow silently leading “but I’m not a leader”, as if somehow the idea itself is so potent that people will just, you know, execute it flawlessly without intervention.
2020s mfers be like “gather berries? Sorry, I’m too busy serving as a neuron in an intercontinental hive mind that poops abstract labor debt coupons, it’s human nature.”
In most cases, they also imagine themselves in a position of power in this new government
Where are you even pulling this from
If you had a point it got lost in this fantasy claim you’ve made up here
Have you ever met a teenager?
Oh that makes sense. The OP is about teenagers, but this comment thread wasn’t necessarily, so I didn’t catch your context
No worries, I just assumed we were continuing the context from the OP
This is a dumb argument. There are clearly better and worse ways to organize a society. There’s no reason to believe capitalism is the best and plenty of reasons to believe it’s not.
I haven’t heard of a better method than (properly regulated) capitalism. I’m open to one though.
Communism and anarchism demonstrably don’t work, so don’t go there with me.
Socialism I would consider a form of Capitalism (imo the best one).
Saying socialism is a form of capitalism is…unconventional. I think very few people would agree. Personally I see socialism as something that can be blended with capitalism, but doing so results in a less capitalist system. And when I see someone advocate for capitalism, I assume they mean the mostly unregulated kind like you see in the US, and which is forced in a lot of poor countries under the guise of “economic development”.
I consider myself a socialist so I guess we’re not as far apart as it seemed at first.
But anyway, the point I was originally trying to make is more general: the best system might not even exist yet. In medieval Europe they thought feudalism was as good as it got, and ideas like capitalism and socialism hasn’t been invented.
I agree with all of that.
My view is, capitalism is an economic program, and socialism is a societal program, and like you said they can be blended. Pure capitalism would have essentially NO societal program (ie no regulations) and would look something like libertarianism.
Then why support capitalism?
They gotta be forced to share.
The biggest way it helps is to just make it easier for the government to implement policies that help people. Under the current system something as simple as rent control is difficult to implement since you are infringing on the rights of the property owner.
And shifting away from capitalism would allow a government to focus on well being of the population without having to worry about the impacts on the stock market. Right now the stock market is so important and shifts down punishes so many people. But in reality it’s such a terrible metric just like GDP. Sometimes a higher GDP just punishes the population of the country for no good reason because inflated prices bump the GDP up even if the citizens can’t afford it.
A different system would help but humanity doesn’t know what that system would be.
We’ve known for roughly 175 years. Some no-name economist and his buddy published their ideas in some kind of manifest
Watch out you might get called a tankie instead of having an actual discussion about a system that values the common man
How did that work out for them?
Thats the Part where canibalism comes Info play
In a non-hierarchical system, yes they do magically disappear.
do they tho
“but some animals” etc etc
Can you give one example of a long-term, large scale, non-hierarchical system in human society?
Ya. Why won’t these fools realize that if something’s never been done before on a large scale to perfection, it’s because it’s clearly impossible. Get on your knees like the rest of us, change is never any good
It would be encouraging to see one attempt at it not to have gone to shit though
So that is a no?
I am not knocking communism. I am knocking humans.
Capitalism and communism are two sides of the same coin.
And the name of the coin is scarcity. While there is limited resources, humans will fuck over others to get more.
Both are attempts to parcel out scarce resources.
Both fail because those that have the power to apportion those resources will favour themselves and their inner circle over the rest of the society.
I think the difference is the incentive structure. Communism has incidental corruption from humans. Capitalism literally rewards it, directly, buy turning capital into a zero sum game.
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And in fairy land, we can eat candy all day and get no cavities
Okay kid.
This is the first time I’ve seen someone directly admit to being in the grip of magical thinking.
Magical thinking, i.e. they don’t agree with our current flawed system and can see the potential of a better way?
Well if that’s your first time, I feel sorry for you. You must hang out with some truly shitty people.
You literally said people will “magically” go away. If you have no system to prevent people from forming power structures, some of them will. If you do have one, it’s a power structure in itself.
This, I mean this happened in our case - we had socialism for 40 years and powerful people either stayed in power or were replaced by idiots.
It really reminds me the “Tax the rich” mindset - good in intention but completely oversimplified and naive in proposed execution
Capitalism is great for handling things that are relatively unimportant. So you don’t want it for medical, education, infrastructure (including utilities), etc. Its fine for things like fashion or the various things might have around the house. Even then it must be highly regulated.
Agreed, although I’d reframe it; capitalism is a solid default, and does a good job of innovating … but it tends to operate like gravity, the more capital you have the more you get.
So, you need a mechanism to redistribute that capital, and you need to make sure that the things everyone is supposed to have enough of, don’t get distributed that way in the first place.
Yeah the way I look at it, capitalism is like oxygen – completely pure, it will react almost anything and destroy it. But dilute/regulate it down, and it’s remarkably useful. Even then though, you need safeguards/antioxidants to help keep it in check.
So the problem isn’t that we breathe oxygen – it’s that we’re breathing 100% pure oxygen instead of normal air (which is like 22% oxygen).
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I disagree… an entirely free market ends up looking a lot like feudalism. I’m not saying propping up companies that are too big to fail isn’t a problem, I’m saying failing to do so is hardly a panacea.
people mistake cronyism for capitalism all the time. the free market can’t be said to have failed if it was never free in the first place. it’s like saying a tree has failed after it’s been cut down and turned into an unstable table.
Let me clear this up, speaking as a capitalist. I make oodles of money and then I pay off people and help my cronies, my cronies help me make more money. That is how a free market and capitalism works and it is working great for me. Frankly I’m offended and aghast at the idea that you don’t want it to be that way, what are you suggesting? Some sort of regulations to stop me from paying whoever I want to do whatever I want? You sound like a fucking communist!
Cronyism and capitalism are hardly mutually exclusive… the idea of an entirely free market is a non sequitur, as without limitations on the market, individuals within it can take control over it, rendering it non free.
There is no such thing as “cronyism” it’s literally just capitalism.
You’ve realised it’s flaws and try to pass off that problem as something different, it’s not.
Cronyism can happen under any system. you just see what it’s done to capitalism and say “See? this is capitalism”
Anyone who thinks communism has never been tried is making the exact same argument.
You’re really not making the same argument, because even China and the USSR didn’t call themselves communist.
Taxing rich people to pay for good paying jobs in healthcare, education, and utility/infrastructure maintenance would help everyone.
Economies need to be a cycle. If the rich just hoard and don’t spend then we can’t spend either.
So if they won’t pay a liveable wage, tax them heavily and start paying liveable wages with the money.
Definately. One problem with money is it has no inherent value. It only has value when it is utilized. So hoarding essentially removes money from the economy. Its like potential and kinetic energy.
But we already solved that problem in financialized capitalism. If the Americans are too poor to buy anything, put them on payment plans, monthly service fees, loans, and credit cards. Now the rich get to hoard as much as they like, and every crisis lets the richest of the rich get their hands on all the small and medium-sized businesses. If the people go poor again, just put them in more debt and give call their purchases “luxury purchases”. You don’t even need to make a profit to run a billion-dollar business anymore.
I think worker cooperatives could handle those things better. It sounds like you’re just looking at the outcomes for consumers, not workers.
I’ve never seen an adolescents defend capitalism. They tend to be either apolitical or anarchists.
I’ve seen a lot of college kids adamant about the invisible hand of the free market solving all problems.
The communists on Lemmy are cringe as fuck and have to make up these situations to justify their positions.
Also they’re nearly all born into wealth lol
Just drop by hexbear some time. It’s fucking hilarious to read their discussion thread, because they’re all children of software engineers and shit.
hexbear
I’ve heard about them, and have no interest in dealing with them.
That’s fair
This has to be a lie. I’ve never seen a single kid educated enough to even know what anarchy is. But they’re definitely dumb enough to parrot their parents.
You’ve never seen a group of adolescents punks? Have ever been outside?
Adolescent punks have zero idea what anarchy is. They just hate their dads
Nobody has any idea what anarchy is. The one tenet of the philosophy is that any time someone tries to define it in any concrete way so that it can be discussed and criticized the anarchists all come out of the woodwork to say “no, that’s not it.” They never say what it is, though, because it isn’t anything.
I can’t imagine the depths of arrogance and ignorance it requires to say that a political theory centuries in the making, with countless theorists writing lengthy tomes on the subject, has nothing to it.
I can quite easily summarise what it is, though. People self organising with no hierarchy. If you want it even simpler, anarchy is not having a ruler or leader; you can glean that just from the construction of the word, “an” (without) ,“archy” (rule), literally, “without a ruler”. There you go! I very much doubt you’ve talked to any anarchists, if you’ve never heard any say that. If you have, you certainly didn’t listen.
Mikhail Bakunin
Noam Chomsky
Pierre-Joseph Proudhon
Emma Goldman
Peter Kropotkin
Just a few names for you to look into, in the field that has no consistent theory, because no one knows what it is.
Actually, they have a pretty good idea of the core principle of “rejecting authority”. That’s the natural state of the adolescent already.
How you would get an adolescent to naturally align with capitalism though, is a mystery for me. Seems like shit lemmygrad would make up.
My rejection of authority is why I’m a liberal.
That makes zero sense
No, it makes total sense. What are you missing?
Because we’re indoctrinated into it from birth. You have to put up active efforts to ignore or critically examine it, in order to believe differently.
Also, hating your dad isn’t rejecting authority, and rejecting authority isn’t anarchism. It’s pretty close, though.
It could be a regional thing. capitalism is practically a religion in the US that parents indoctrinate their kids into.
We prime them from young ages to buy what the commercials show them
Some regions of the US.
The US is huge, it’s not all Alabama
When I was in high school it was still popular for kids to be ‘libertarians’. Right-leaning area, naturally.
Same, I’ve only ever seen them be completely oblivious
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Almost anything but capitalist, yes. But apperently America (USA) is different. Which also kind of makes sense.
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So you never learned what socialism and communism were… you were always a lib, and you’re a lib now lmao
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Literal Nazi propaganda, not gonna argue with you.
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That’s because those people are always assuming they will be living capitalism from the CEO’S perspective after school. never from the worker’s perspective.
Can you give one example of a long-term, large scale, non-hierarchical system in human society?
Anarchism. We used it for most of human history, hierarchical societies are only 6k years old. The human species has existed for 200k years.
Are you joking? Ever heard of tribalism? Even monkeys use it.
Yes, because everyone everywhere for all of history has followed the exact same formula for organizing and defending their tribes.
Anarchism. We used it for most of human history
Total horseshit.
Name one society based on Anarchism
Instead of just one, here’s a whole Wikipedia article on the subject.
Those do not meet the criteria of what was asked.
Examples of intentional anarchical societies don’t meet the criteria of anarchical societies?
This was the actual original request
Can you give one example of a long-term, large scale, non-hierarchical system in human society?
Nothing on that page is an example of this
I spent 5 seconds during my morning routine to look this up. Would you rather I spend 3 hours writing a dissertation on all of the indigenous communities that have existed since prehistory that are structured in an egalitarian and anarchical way? You’re also allowed to look this shit up. I recommend Andrewism on youtube, he pulls a lot of examples from anarchical indigenous societies
And where are they today?
Can you give one example of a long-term, large scale, non-hierarchical system in human society?
Long-term =/= Permanent
Humans have existed much, MUCH longer than our current structure of civilization.
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Polynesians strike me as a good example. Those motherfuckers were the first to sail around the world, thousands of years before Columbus.
The title of the article actually disproves your assertion.
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Teenage anarchism ideologies basically boild down to “So I won’t have to go to school and read anymore”. If they actually knew what anarchism is, they’d be surprised to learn that there is a lot of reading to do in order to fully understand an anarchist society or one of its many sub-structures.
Anarchy doesn’t necessarily mean chaos without structure, as many believe. However, chaos without structure is one of the variants of anarchy.
Anarchy literally means feudalism within a generation
anarchism does not have to mean absence of law
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sorry but you’re wrong, it’s a lot more complicated than that
Anarchism means without rulers, not without rules
Who enforces the rules?
Most laws that exist serve to protect private property. An anarchist society wouldn’t have private property, so most laws that exist would be to punish transgressions between individuals. Political anarchy is not “do whatever you want, whenever you want, no exceptions”. It’s a direct democracy without hierarchy, with elected stewards to manage the shared property in a library economy.
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Tell us you’re not listening without saying you’re not really listening
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Yep, not actually listening at all
Lol your entire argument deflated when he responded actually knowing what he’s talking about
Anarchism is not the absence of law.
So why don’t YOU take your teenager education and learn more?
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It’s almost like having a job that pays okay is still A) Not making me happy and B) contributing to the Earth’s destruction.
I love working the majority of my waking life just to scrape by, what a wonderful system where the only escape is being born privileged or working yourself even closer to death and taking advantage of other people to start a business
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The world might be ending but at least I have expensive things!
Anarchism. We used it for most of human history
Tribes are not anarchies. They have leaders. Put any group of people together and a hierarchy naturally forms. You actually have to work really, really hard to prevent this. That’s why anarchies are so unstable and rarely last longer than a few years.
Yeah, I like having electricity, plumbing, and not needing to murder other males to protect my harem too much. We need some sort of society, not the absence of one.
Anarchy is the lack of heirarchy, not the lack of society. Please educate yourself before making an ignorant comment like this.
an·ar·chy /ˈanərkē/ noun
-a state of disorder due to absence or nonrecognition of authority or other controlling systems. -the organization of society on the basis of voluntary cooperation, without political institutions or hierarchical government; anarchism.
Educated enough? Everybody gonna cooperate and no one is going to go Mad-Max robber Baron on essential resources? Everyone going to voluntarily decide to fix potholes and collect garbage?
It’s wild that some people here will agree that libertarianism is dumb and wouldn’t work, but then turn around and say anarchism is the best system.
Yep. Doesn’t work. Ultimately, Anarchism, socialism, communism, libertarianism, democracy are all ideals. A functioning society can’t and won’t be a 100% ideal system. There are jerks, grifters, thieves and fanatics who will subvert those ideals for personal gain, or simply to harm others. We can work towards the ideal priciples of those social systems, but we will never, and should never reach them.
But we evolved away from it as our societies and needs became more complex. Maybe it worked when we were hunter gatherers living in caves but modern society requires a heriarchy to organise and maintain it.
Hunter-gatherers have hierarchies, too. Don’t buy this BS.
Many complex societies were egalitarian eg Cucatenia Trypillia, IVC etc.
We didn’t “evolve” away from egalitarianism because complexity yada yada yada. Hierarchy just won because it’s more oppressive and violent.
Hierarchy just won because it’s more oppressive and violent.
Let’s say you’re right. How can anarchy win, then?
So… an evil system that puts the majority of people on the bottom to be exploited is ok because it’s more violent and kills all other systems?
I’m not a tactician, or strategist.
I don’t care how it can win. It has to, or we all will die lmao.
Why do we need hierarchy? Are you unable to make decisions?
About all the facets of modern life? Yes. At least, completely informed decisions.
I don’t know much about West Nile Virus. If I get West Nile, I need to consult an expert.
Who decides who’s an expert? Why should I trust what Jane says and not what Steve says?
To organise and manage. Who’s going to set and control healthcare? The economy? Utilities? Infrastructure? Defence?Education? Justice? Social care? I don’t have the time nor will to make informed decisions about every single policy or law. I’d imagine the vast majority of people are ere same. We have representatives to make these decisions for us.
All of those “problems” are predicated on the ideas that private ownership of the means of production is necessary, that borders are a natural phenomenon, and that the social ills under capitalism are facts of life experienced by everyone in every era. None of that is true. Why don’t you have the time or energy to help organize and be involved with your community? Is it because of work? We’ve made tremendous strides in automating the means of production, but what has that meant for us? More people unemployed and unable to pay for the necessities in life, while we maintain the 40 hour work week to do the same work in one day as a 100 hour work week in 1900. We don’t need to move at this breakneck pace to make someone else billions of dollars.
I agree that common people need to do more organizing, but all that organizing will be a waste of time without a hierarchy. I’ve seen it happen loads of times. You get a bunch of people together with a lot of passion, but nobody can decide on an agenda or a plan, and all of that energy evaporates and nothing gets accomplished.
Occupy Wall Street
The cops, media, and oligarchs were organized. The protesters, though numerous, were not.
I don’t think any of the things I listed have anything to do with who owns the means of production. They’re all public (well maybe not in every country) services. And policy and regulation has to be set for them as time goes on.
Honestly, I don’t want to be much involved in my community. It just doesn’t interest me, I’d rather spend time with my family or spend time on my hobbies.
I disagree on that, but I don’t have the mental health capacity anymore to elaborate.
That’s understandable too, and we should have the ability to do so without a pursuit of wages. The coercive nature of work prevents you from enjoying the things you want to enjoy. Personally, I consider the theft of our free time cruelty. I want to have time to see my friends and family that live hours away. I want to work on the apps I started in college. I want to go fishing. I want to be a contributing member of my community. I can’t do any of that, because I need to pay for food, rent, electricity, vehicle maintenance, my education loan, and more. A system that forces us to suppress our desires in favor of seeking a wage is unjust, and does far more harm to people as a society than anything an individual could do on their own. I don’t want to turn those personal apps into a “side-hustle”, I just want to make something in the hopes that at least someone finds it useful and can enjoy it. I want a society that encourages our kindhearted, social, and generous nature, not one that purely emphasizes our greedy side.
Tribalism.
Young workers doing shit work don’t like their jobs.
News at 11.
So when do people typically start enjoying their work?
According to some research, the switchover is at around $250k a year or thereabouts.
I stopped hating my work at around $100k AND good boss/coworkers. Haven’t gotten around to “enjoy” yet but it’s not bad. I don’t dread coming to work, and I feel more or less content. I even work harder than I need to a lot of the time.
Retirement
Generally, but not always, the difference is the same as the difference between a job and a career.
Some people really do like their jobs though. Just need to hunt around for one you like.
For me, it was when I began my career
Generally, but not always, the difference is the same as the difference between a job and a career.
Some people really do like their jobs though. Just need to hunt around for one you like.
For me, it was when I began my career.
Capitalist systems produce bullshit jobs that people don’t like.
More news at 7.
Is there a system that only creates jobs that’s perfect for them?
Yes, anarchism /s
Needing fewer jobs means having fewer bullshit ones.
So in your mind what’s a bullshit job, and how would another system mean such jobs aren’t required? Would it mean there’s more non-bullshit jobs for people to do?
Door attendants. People will open doors for themselves.
We don’t need more jobs, we need fairer distribution of resources, just as the good Lord intended.
Acts 4:32–35: ³² “And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common. ³³ And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus: and great grace was upon them all. ³⁴ Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, ³⁵ And laid them down at the apostles’ feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.”
In my experience, the people who work retail and food service are more likely to favor socialism and collective action. But not all of them, of course.
The people who justify capitalism tend to work in higher paid office or managerial jobs. Not all of them, of course, as I am an example, and as are the ton of lower paid office workers that hate their jobs.
Turns out, the people for whom capitalism worked out, tend to like it. Those being crushed by the weight of unsustainable consumption tend to hate it. Go figure.
I don’t like to think that I or we really can’t imagine a better system but I don’t think it’s completely unrealistic to say something like best we got. I say this only because things like communism and all their promises can only really come about through a revolution and the price in blood is jaw dropping. So much killing. It also almost certainly means people materially worse off for a long time if not the rest of their lives in the wake of this revolution even if over generations it manages to eventually deliver.
I’m all for substantial reform and leftist/liberal politics but it’s difficult for me to ignore the great peril and huge gamble of revolution. Some times a society successfully manages to make things so bad that there’s so little to lose that it can seem a realistic option but I think everybody considering that option should weigh it very carefully. It’s very possible to sacrifice everything including your own life and thousands of others’ only for the whole thing to get derailed by opportunists and to make a bad situation so much worse.
I say this only because things like communism and all their promises can only really come about through a revolution and the price in blood is jaw dropping. So much killing. It also almost certainly means people materially worse off for a long time if not the rest of their lives in the wake of this revolution even if over generations it manages to eventually deliver.
These same arguments can be used to ward off a revolution against a dictatorship or absolutist monarchy, though. Or even against slavery.
It’s true.
You say this as if capitalism isn’t responsible for hundreds of thousands, if not millions or more of deaths
It is not, if anything capitalism for preventing billions of deaths
This is one of the three big problems of communism for me, though I believe that long term there’s no other way forward than by using violence. The few that are powerful got there by willing to play dirty and please the rest of the bourgeoisie instead of the people, and anyone that enters that scene hoping to make a change will either be forced to play that game or to be kicked out. It’s a endless circle that only force or technology can break, and I don’t bet on technology making things better for us.
The other two are:
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Realistically the proletariat can’t all run a state together simply because there’s too many voices, so there always ends up being a few that rule over the many. Some have proven to believe in the cause and not use their newfound power for a new bourgeoisie to arise, but eventually they will pass away and someone has to take their place. How do you make sure that no one ends up betraying the people leading to either reviving the old system or a new bloody revolution?
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The late stage withering of the state is a nice concept that does make sense assuming that society completely changes after a long time of living in an equal system, but it hasn’t been seen in practice. Of course it’s unfair to rule it away since it wasn’t inefficiency that killed communism but outer interferences from capitalist countries that feared communism like the plaugue (which makes sense given that the rulers of those countries don’t want to become one with the proletariat and definitely don’t wan’t to be imprisoned, exiled or executed).
This is the first time I’ve seen this mentioned on lemmy, and it’s always been my fundamental concern with communism. We’ve never made it to the end state of communism - to date, it has always stopped at the authoritarian stage, which is supposed to be temporary and transitional.
Arguments can be made that this is a product of foreign interference, and there’s definitely merit to that, but it’s not the whole picture. No matter what political system you have, highly concentrated power is not easy to dismantle and socialize. It doesn’t magically get easier just because you ousted the old guard and put new people in that position. So long as there is benefit to being the leader, you’re generally looking at people who want those benefits, not the responsibility of carrying the project forward.
Technology could address some of the difficulties involved in direct democracy (which, imo, is THE fundamental thing required in communism - hell, democratic capitalist countries would benefit too), but there are many ways to manipulate a populace so that it almost wouldn’t matter.
I’m not going to pretend I have any answers here, or that communism as a political system is inherently bad, but the draw of power is a fundamental source of corruption no matter what your stated intent is.
Communism is simply an economic framework, not a political one. I dont agree with the notion that authoritarianism is a prerequisite for communist society.
At the very least the existence of anarcho communism points towards that.
Fair - I did wonder about inappropriately conflating things around this point - but a transitional ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ is definitely a stage of development in communism. For what it’s worth, what I’m reading on the subject right now is this (only started reading after commenting, prior comments based on previous knowledge/discussions of communism): https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/staterev/ch05.htm
Admittedly, perhaps not all flavours of communism, but it’s hard to argue with this showing up in history. The question becomes: is it really a dictatorship of the proletariat? Or a separate political class using that language and ideology to justify their position?
I will be the first to admit I’m not up-to-date with my communist theory, nor aware of the dominant strains of it in contemporary good faith discourse. So I’m happy to be presented with rebuttals or different positions on this - the more you know and all that.
You seem well intended, no worries.
Just for an example, Im a libertarian communist. I believe in a Democratic communism where a direct democracy makes larger political decisions.
Somewhere between anarcho communist and socialist. My view on governments, communist or otherwise, is that they should be only big enough to help the people. It should serve effectively no other purpose but to run social programs and to stop greedy people.
The dictatorship of the proletariat originally, in Marx’s work, did not mean a literal dictatorship, but a democratic government run for the workers with the effective exclusion of other potential power centers. He refers to capitalist democracy in turn as a dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, for reference.
Marxist-Leninists are the big offenders here, because two of the major ‘innovations’ to Marxism introduced by Marxist-Leninists (at least, two which are relevant here) are that of the revolutionary vanguard (that you need to give power to a small number of people who are really well-read on theory, and THAT’S what will save the revolution), and the idea that you can ‘skip’ over capitalist democracy and go straight to socialism if you just try really hard and shoot a lot of people who think wrong.
Marx was long-dead by the time Marxism-Leninism came about.
Communism is an entire social philosophy, not just an economic model.
I fully agree, it’s refreshing to find someone open minded that can have an actual discussion over politics without going all agressive and insane
Communism IS fundamentally bad. Why? Because it’s inherently authoritarian, oppressive, and violent. The utopia is just that, a fantasy. We’ll never achieve an a perfect society. Therefore, this ideology will always be permanently stuck in it’s authoritarian, oppressive, and violent stage. The authoritarians in power will never voluntarily give up their power, they’ll never stop oppressing and killing people, and they will never agree that the utopia arrived. The communist utopia will always be just around the corner.
The few that are powerful got there by willing to play dirty and please the rest of the bourgeoisie instead of the people, and anyone that enters that scene hoping to make a change will either be forced to play that game or to be kicked out
This is conspiracy-theorist nonsense.
Real “drain the swamp” energy
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In the face of capitalist derived climate catastrophe, I’m not sure if we have any options.
All you need to do here is show that non-capitalist systems won’t consume fossil fuels, which I find to be extremely unlikely.
Communism doesn’t incentive excess production or planned obsolescence. Historically they also had good public transportation.
Im saying there is a lot of energy waste in capitalism that leads to tons of emisions
Its no coincidence that the the US is one of the highest emitters of carbon.
Energy waste like heating homes, powering hospitals, and getting food from point A to point B?
Considering the Holodomor maybe that last point I can concede
What exactly are you arguing?
Are you suggesting communist societies don’t have heat, hospitals and transport?
Are you suggesting there aren’t green methods to achieve those?
That list in particular , yes they can be covered by renewables
Im am of the belief that we cant maintain our current lavish lives on renewables alone though.
Personally I think scaling back mixed with renewables is the answer. Less priority for the meat industry (of which I am a partaker), more work from home, more low emmision public transport.
There is no one silver bullet in the fight against the climate change. It will take an amalgamation of methods.
No. The exact opposite.
I think you clearly are misinterpreting my argument.
Capitalism produces MORE emissions. That’s all im saying. I never said Communism produces zero emmisions.
Those aren’t wastages. Also…
Lmao I can’t believe you actually linked some shit-ass YouTube video saying the Holodomor was fine, actually.
some shit-ass YouTube videoA thoroughly researched essay on the subject
saying the Holodomor was fine, actually.saying the Soviet famine was a fucking travesty, and Stalin should be shot, but there is no indication it was a deliberate policy
At least watch the first 10 seconds, ya fucking goof
Why? Production would be drastically lower, because there’s no need to flood the market. Democracy would dictate what gets produced, so an educated population would object to polluting industries, and thus not support them, leading to their demise.
Because people love to not die, and suddenly ending our use of fossil fuels would kill a fuckload of people.
Dude think for half a minute
First off, I disagree with that assessment. But secondly, are you implying climate change won’t kill people?
No I’m responding to the idea that communists won’t use fossil fuels, which they did, and would.
How do you think Venezuela affords their socialism?
This is just the dumbest take possible.
Where did I say communists don’t use fossil fuels? I do maintain they use objectively less though. There just less need less production all around.
Hell, your knowledge about. Venezuela is even incorrect. Its categorically a failed socialist state, not a communist one.
No one said communism “doesn’t use fossil fuels”, so I’m not sure why you’re trying to disprove that
It doesn’t need to end fucking immediately, because of that very reason.
Think for just a second, friendo.
Weird that you’d want economic conditions that don’t contribute to new tech rather than economic conditions that do contribute to new tech, then.
Also I’m not your friend.
Source? Do people just not go to school or have ambitions to improve the world, simply because their basic needs are met? You think no one dreams of tech in communism? That a social order based on cooperation and mutual aid would not engender exactly that?
You could have saved yourself some typing and just written “I’m selfish and wilfully ignorant”
First - educate yourself on communism, you clearly know nothing about it, but the fact that you’re against it because “bloodshed” yet are openly in support of capitalism makes you nothing more than a wilfully ignorant hypocrite.
Capitalism has and continues to kill hundreds of millions (at least, in all the time it’s existed) for profit in war, with hunger and restricted access to water, with homelessness and poverty, with preventable disease, all created and excused with the myth of artificial scarcity, with climate change, with immoral laws and entire systems designed to keep large segments of the population as slave labour, which is what they used to gain their power and wealth to be in the position to impose all of this in the first place. And all that just off the top of my head, there is so much more violence that is inflicted on us daily, they’ve just got most people, yourself included obviously, convinced that’s just life, when it really really isn’t. And those who actually benefit are never just going to give all of that up.
You keep mentioning the potential “sacrifice” which tells me just how privileged you are, but don’t be mistaken - that privilege will only keep you safe for so long, and you not giving a shit about those of us who don’t have it and are already suffering and dying under the system you’re so eager to defend despite openly admitting to not understanding it (and displaying no understating of the alternative either), doesn’t change the fact that said system is destroying the planet and everything on it, and no amount of bootlicking will save you from that.
First - educate yourself on communism
Wow, this is such a shit 😀 So everyone got it wrong, that’s why it failed everywhere.
But you know what, go for it. It fucked up my country but I’m sure this time it’s gonna be different, this time you get it right 🙂 I just grab my popcorn and enjoy the show
Many many capitalist societies have failed, but we let survivorship bias cloud our judgement.
We’ve only really attempted communism a couple of times.
Heck, all of the communist societies were built from the ashes of capitalist ones.
Heck, all of the communist societies were built from the ashes of capitalist ones.
I mean, Soviet Russia and China were really built on the bones of feudal societies, and that’s something that Marx warned against.
Saving this liberal-killer comment
Go for it.
I have loads more links saved, but these come in handy most often:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/10/14/liberalism-and-fascism-partners-in-crime/
https://blacklikemao.medium.com/how-liberalism-helps-fascism-d4dbdcb199d9I wonder what excuse they’ll use next to make sure they don’t have to read anything that might challenge their bias.https://libcom.org/article/capitalist-democracy-illusion-choice
Thank you very kindly. These will come in useful for future arguments against libs and reactionaries.
Linking a site titled “blacklikemao.com” will not win you any arguments and will get you laughed at
Maybe by people like you, but that doesn’t concern me.
I would be the person you’d be arguing with, so yes.
Do not use those links because rather than be “lib-killing” they are “lib-amusing”
The only people who will actually “suffer” or have anything to lose from such a revolution are the owning class
These sob stories you hear from people who “fled communist oppression” are just people who lost untold privilege. We call them “communists stole my slaves” stories
this is an unhinged reply if you actually think that. ask people from Poland or some post soviet countries what they thought about living under totalitarian communism.
People loved their totalitarian boot-on-face experience and anyone saying otherwise just believes propaganda, comrade.
That’s why all those people were weeping instead of celebrating when the Berlin wall was torn down
I’d ask them, but they’d have no frame of reference. They never lived under communism. They definitely lived under socialism, though.
Pretty sure there are people who lived under communism still alive in that country.
Hell, probably about 50% at this point (depending on birth and death rates).
So there are literally millions of people who have the experience to ask.
Not a single one.
What do you think communism is?
Look up its definition. Compare that to the political system found in the USSR. See they are not the same.
Lenin started a path towards it, called socialism, but by the time Stalin was in power, revisionism was in full effect oriented toward market reforms.
Do you ever actually get outside your bubble and realise you been fed a bunch of horseshit or do you just plug your ears going nanananana naaaa I can’t hear you?
Because you are on some wierd tankie shit.
The projection lmao, have you maybe thought about the fact that you’ve been fed BS all your life and here you are now spewing it without actually knowing what you’re talking about
Yes, in fact, that is how i learned this “tankie shit”. So ironic. I had to get out of my bubble to stop believing in liberalism.
Do you think society shelters and fosters socialist beliefs? No. It forces liberalism down our throats from the day we’re born.
It would take only the most cursory examination of documented revolutions, communist ones as much as any other to immediately see that that’s not the case. Millions get swept up in it. People starve, civil and international wars are fought and combatants die, civilians become collateral damage, power struggles emerge within the ranks of the revolutionaries and loyal partisans are swept aside so ambitious people can ascend. Revolutionary zeal leads to countless cases of misidentification of suspected ‘reactionaries’, economic turmoil creates desperation leading to violence and crime and then further violence in the attempts to restore order. In the chaos and lawlessness of the initial stages of a revolution people will take the opportunity to settle old scores. Individuals who previously held no power now take up new roles in the new society and wield even tiny petty amounts of power yet still more than they could have dreamed of before and turn out not to be responsible with it and others still manage to claim masses of it.
And this is only the people who you would hopefully agree didn’t ‘deserve’ it, but for me on a personal level, though it does make me rather useless I suppose, I’m not in to killing, so even those who arguably did ‘deserve’ it, the ‘ruling’ classes, I may be glad to see them stripped of the privilege and influence but I don’t want to see them or anyone strung up. And in the period of re-defining and re-shaping society after the revolution the new order will seek to identify just who counts as ‘ruling class’, this has, in the past included people who owned a shop, people with ‘bourgeois’ jobs in the former government, teachers accused by students of being ‘reactionaries’.
It might just be that communism really can, if not de-railed create a utopia on Earth and it might just be that all that happens above really is actually what just needs to happen for us to get there, but I’m not sure I could stomach it.
I don’t agree with such extremes, such as the executions of landlords etc.
This, I have to admit, is my one sticking point in actually calling myself a communist. This one question has tortured me for a long time:
What do you actually DO about the reactionaries and counter revolutionaries?
The USSR sent them to gulags. That seems harsh, but it’s something. Mao’s China killed them, and I’m sure similar things happened in Cuba.
There has to be an option that doesn’t scare people or cause horror in general, but I don’t think I personally have a perfect answer. I could say, “the average person won’t be mistaken for a bourgeois,” but I don’t know how convincing that will be. The revolution would have to be truly perfect for that to happen.
What I can say, though, is that Marxists of the present day recognise and condemn these actions, and the Marxist tradition teaches us to constantly reevaluate our methods, in the scientific discipline of observation, experiment, reflection and so on. It’s a cold way to put it, but the mistakes of the past have been carefully studied to ensure they can’t happen again.
That doesn’t mean new mistakes can’t happen. We are only human, and even democratic will can run foul. But we can use our knowledge of material conditions to measure our approach. Only ever what the people want - and what we want is justice for all.
I’ve thought about this a lot. I wonder if a good compromise would be a requirement for maybe 10-20% of all issued and outstanding shares of publicly traded companies to be owned by non-officer employees. It doesn’t even have to be given away freely. They could be sold to employees and/or given as part of their total comp. Just enough to get a seat on the board elected by them. Seems reasonable.
#‘#I’m14aandthisisdeep’
Yes, but it’s still better than being in the exact same position but having to join a ten year waiting list for a Lada.
the difference between a capitalist bread line and a socialist bread line is that when you get to the end of the capitalist line, you have to pay for the bread.
I love the smell of false dichotomies in the morning!
Then you must love Lemmy. You can’t move a millimetre around here without someone saying that if you don’t support a bloody, violent revolution to implement a system that has been an unmitigated disaster every time it’s been tried then you’re a capitalist boot-licker.
I block those people.
You really gotta be a dumbass teenager to defend capitalism. What the fuck is it offering you?! I was an anarchist communist when I was 13. Wake up, we are running out of time
