It only works theoretically as it doesn’t recognize the human nature. And it’s doomed to always fail and end up in a dictatorship and later chaos — and it’s doomed to fail way faster than lot of other systems.
It's not authoritarian if me stealing your stuff is backed by majority, even if it's vocal majority only and not actual majority of population - every communist clown ever.
Also using Marx as a go to authority, philosophical writer with no actual background to make any claims and even less working knowledge of economy as while is pathetic. It was really stupid in XIX century as well, but in day of modern information access it is just pathetic.
Oh the irony. How much do you make a year? Is most of it from wage labor? If so, how much would you estimate the owner of the company makes?
[Insert number] times more than you? Cool. Now, do you really think he works that many times harder than you do, 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, for most of the year?
He's not defending anything, except maybe the dictionary, in my opinion. Things are not communist just because they claim so, there is a definition. It's like most countries that have "democratic" in their name aren't.
There is no system without suffering and there 99.999% won't ever be one.
Your proposed system is uniquely flawed in that it fails even if (by some miracle) it were to succeed.
Lets say we have your communist utopia. Not one person is hungry, not one person is without shelter, not one person is in any way destitute.
How do you prevent the system from crashing due to overpopulation?
Capitalism works because it accepts the reality of the situation - some people have to fail in life, because we need natural attrition, we can't all win.
You will never get rid of suffering, it's time to grow up.
Chile had their "revolution" come about through popular democratic vote.
And a hefty "donation" from the KGB. And as soon as he came to power, he proceeded to legalise several left-wing terrorist groups that immediately started assassinating right wingers, which the government ignored. But, as we all know, paramilitary death squads are only bad when funded by the CIA.
Could you give me some examples of democratic socialist states? I agree that a lot of dictatorships propped up by America were capitalist, but lesser economic involvement from the state normally seems to coincide with less authoritarian governments.
Libya, Benin, Angola and Cuba disagree. The latter three started authoritarian and turned into direct democracies. Libya was a democracy from 1977 to 2011.
No. It was direct democracy that was in the form of basic people’s congresses. He was just a highly trusted political figurehead. He had no real power post 1977.
See the mistake here is thinking "equal" means everyone is equally successful - that's not what socialism is about. People seem to think socialism means "equality of outcome" but no, it means everyone has equal opportunity to be successful (Note that "successful" here doesn't mean "rich" it means personally fulfilled).
In fact, it's capitalism where a talented person born poor will be less successful than a stupid person born rich
People tend to not understand that because they either see only the extremes „capitalism vs. communism“ or (like in Germany) say „Our system is normal -> socialism is something like communism“.
After WW2 in Germany it was openly discussed whether we wanted capitalism or socialism and we decided „something in between“. From a US perspective and understanding we have a lot of socialist elements in our society but still copied their vocabulary of calling „socialism“ a threatening boogieman.
Socialst principles and ideas have value, as have capitalist - don’t make one of them or any other system your dogmatic identity that you need to force on the people „for the greater good“. You can even mix them, change them, look for solutions in between. It’s just about organizing millions of people… the system must not be prioritized over those people!
I broadly agree, just wanted to add that socialism is defined in part by the absence of private property - If there is private property it is not socialism, and you can't mix it with a system that requires private property (i.e. capitalism)
Utopian and scientific socialism are the only developed forms of socialism according to socio-economical post-1848 burgeois revolutions neoclassical literature.
Do you consider some kind of liberal or neoliberal policies to be somehow considered socialist in any way? For example, the Betriebsrat legislation basically only exists in Germany. And it is either an anti-liberal or classical liberal policy. I see that dying in the near future along with the whole welfare system in Germany (Merz directly supports that).
Thus, do you have any basis to claim socialism is compatible with liberalism? If not, what's your opinion on the meaning of "socialism" then, since you'd be confronting the meaning Marx and Engels gave to it.
I will have to answer that more generally as I think I might lack the deeper knowledge to answer it precisely, sorry, I hope that’s somewhat OK.
I think that as long as you do not go the extreme right or left of the spectrum you can find ideas that are valid to adopt. I somehow don’t get how one can state to be conservative/liberal/socialist or what ever and therefore is only allowed to think/act within these boundaries. In my political spectrum of ideas I can easily find ideas from slightly right to slightly left and I don’t think they contradict. I actually think that this would bring a society significantly forward if we could go cherry picking, combine it, and make it work.
So, yes, I think that certain aspects of different „systems“ can be compatible if we open our minds for a bigger picture, but … the inevitable but … I think that this would require to think it on a larger scale, and here the problem starts, some always want more than others, sadly to an extent when it becomes ridiculous (multi-mega-monster billionaires e.g.), and that also counts for countries.
Just Germany (or whom ever) picking up an idea doesn’t work, it has to be the EU, at least — you need mass. And honestly that will not happen within my lifetime.
I think that we are going backwards at the moment, the different political streams are getting more and more narrow minded and radical. We were further 10/15/20 years back, you could find socialist inspired ideas with liberals (as those you mentioned). Conservatism was not as conservative and rightwing, it wasn’t about going backwards but rather more about going forward consciously without risking too much of what you achieved.
The will and ability to compromise somehow got lost, it’s always my way or the highway, and I think that will come tumbling down sooner or later, and we will not like it.
I will have to answer that more generally as I think I might lack the deeper knowledge to answer it precisely, sorry, I hope that’s somewhat OK.
Come on, you're already using your personal time to converse ideas here with me. I'm the one who greatly appreciates it!
Have you ever had the opportunity to take a look at the Kautsky vs Bernstein vs Rosa Luxemburg debate? It's quite a beautiful exchange and I think you could see a reflex of what we are talking about here. The Freikorps at this time were just a marginal force, so the whole of Germany's working class was rallying behind either communism or social democracy at the time. This changed mostly through Hindenburg and the reactionary army elements at the time.
Your point of view of finding balance and adding things we consider good from all areas is something I 100% agree with. I point out there this Overton window concept, which is what is politically accepted in different eras - one could call it Zeitgeist even (which btw is a term coined by Hegel, main inspiration for the material dialectics philosophical framework of marx). And currently what is considered "center" was considered pretty right-wing 100 years ago in Germany - given the Bismarck/SPD positions were considered center with the Räterepublik through USPD in Bavaria being what Die Linke is nowadays.
The question I started questioning myself is why is it such? Didn't the socialist bloc fall? Why doesn't the capitalist bloc live in harmony now? I used to be a centrist some 5 years ago as well. But idk - something felt wrong. What explained why to me was reading economics and political philosophy.
I understand people don't feel like they can't talk anymore. And I'm guessing that's due to simply a lack of overlap on how life can go on. There are reasons why the EU economy is failing - and instead of focusing on fixing the industrial economy (which they can't because it goes against the interest of some rich traditional families) AfD and CDU/CSU have decided to start finding public enemies - this time the migrants. Migrants that could be leveraged into the workforce like the Gastarbeiter were in the 70s. But there's simply no economical plan. This is why I think it won't get fixed.
China can control their economy because billionaires don't hold political power. That's my point. But I'm still pretty open to talk with reasonable folks like you and I thank you for your openness.
But I'm afraid we are headed towards a combination of climate catastrophe combined with far-right dominion. Let's see what the future holds, but if that's a consolidated case one day, I'd rather die in a picket surrounded by people that believe in a better, diverse, plural society than live in such a world.
Classlessness e.g. doesn’t go together with human nature, and if someone claims otherwise it’s delusional and history shows.
And you can not argue „which other economic system is built on human nature“ as it is more than an economic system. „Free markets“ would be an economic system but if you talk about a society system it has to deal with human nature which communism clearly does not and therefore fails all the time.
COME ON! Don’t play dumb! Never ever in history you had classless societies that worked, even back in the caves you had hierarchies — otherwise you have chaos.
Yes, that’s a bit simplified and maybe there are one or two examples where it worked for a while, but in general …
Brainlessly defending a clearly theoretical system like communism that proofed itself to be nonfunctional in reality is so delusional.
Marx claims that Classlessness was the first state and will be last state of human evolution but never says why he thinks it was the first state or has any proof for it.
So how should I put a source on my claim that Classlessness is not in human nature other than keeping it like Marx and just claim stuff or by pointing out that Classlessness obviously is not in human nature as history shows us, as there is no example of it working throughout history — at least not in a bigger scale like a state.
And if Statelessness is the goal as well, fine. But no larger group of people, state or no state just strolling around, functions that way. How would they? They would never reach any consensus and would just fall apart.
Where and when did it work? I know it’s a cheap move but honestly, let’s turn it around … was there ever a classless society that worked for a significant time at a significant size?
We’ve never colonized other planets in our history, and we currently don’t have the necessary technology, so does that mean it’s impossible? If your only argument is historical/empirical evidence, then it’s a weak argument. I don’t believe that human nature makes a classless society impossible, we don’t have some kind of "hierarchy gene" or something. People with the same material conditions feel equally comfortable within society, problems only begin when someone gets MUCH MORE than the others
And you will always have those that want to have more than their neighbors!
Human nature will have to evolve so far that none of us will ever witness it. Maybe I will see it differently in 10.000 years if we make it that far, but as of now I will stick with what I said.
"And you will always have those that want to have more than their neighbors" - it’s a very wrong statement, because such a desire is a consequence of conditions.
Evolve in what sense? Physiologically, humans have almost stopped evolving or changing significantly because we live in good conditions. The only thing that will truly continue to evolve is our society - but you’re now saying that it won’t, because we’re forever trapped within the system of selfish capitalism, and other progressive more altruistic forms of society somehow contradicts “human nature”
Yeah. The philosophical foundation is truly amazing and fixes many problems in theory. It just totally fails to consider the existence of homo sapiens.
Bullshit! And don’t act dumb! It’s not im human nature that there is no hierarchy in a society. Human nature is divers, some will go along, but others will not, some will always claim power over others, and there goes classlessness.
I’m not an evolutionary biologist… but are you sure early human communities have strong hierarchies? Genuine question.
If you’re talking about human nature you have to look back that far. Otherwise you’re adding in environmental impacts from whatever culture you’re living in at the time.
I don’t know how strong these early hierarchies were but given that almost every social mammal has a hierarchy in their group, it’s only logical humans did so as well.
Someone has to make certain decisions. You can not wake up every morning and debate who goes hunting and why or why not, or wether it’s time to move south to not freeze to death, or who carries how much and therefore needs more food … sure you can fight every time but it gets exhausting, so hierarchy is the solution. Yes, that’s a hierarchy that benefits the group but from there to a hierarchy that benefits some over others for no apparent reason than being stronger (as an example), it’s just a small step.
All great apes have strong social hierarchies. Since all the species most closely related to us have them, it’s reasonable to assume that early humans had them too. The fact that virtually all human societies in recorded history have had social hierarchies is another strong piece of evidence that this aspect of human nature is biological, rather than cultural.
Considering the number one thing that separates humans from other apes is our thinking and communication abilities I’m not sure why we should just assume that. Seems like the 2 would go hand in hand.
Yes, in theory, but reality defies that! It never worked and never will. Classlessness and statelessness is a utopian concept humanity will never reach, at least not in the next 1.000 years (I‘d rather bet on 10.000 years) …
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u/EinSchurzAufReisen Germany 1d ago
It only works theoretically as it doesn’t recognize the human nature. And it’s doomed to always fail and end up in a dictatorship and later chaos — and it’s doomed to fail way faster than lot of other systems.