It’s funny because it’s the dominant system and any other proposed system would handle the respective situation worse on average but is highly situational. You get into arguments that devolved into, “well, there’s massive starvation and war but at least we are all equal”
Notice how you are getting downvoted but no one is providing an argument against this. Even in the most directive form (fascist) of socialism, they still choose not to go with the better option for the world.
Workers don’t vote themselves more work for the money. Less work equals less crops. Crops don’t care. This is why socialism as an economic base always devolves into directive work (which I would argue is actual state slavery)
There are other various options for socialism and anarchism of course. Unless you line out specifically which flawed system you propose we cannot address it. Anything that still has private ownership at it’s base is still capitalist though so most Western models such as the Nordics don’t count.
Also, corporations are not owned by one dude. This is the benefit of the corporate model over sole proprietorships at a societal level but whatever is most efficient in the end.
It is inevitable that starvation would happen because all of the systems you mention are inflexible to shocks and periods of instability and we do see this through history in socialist areas. That’s not even to mention the potential for genocide with all economic production in the control of the majority(in the most ideal circumstance)
The issue with claiming for those three systems is that it’s exactly what was attempted to set up in the USSR and under the CCP. Decentralization very quickly led to av massive collapse in production. It was swept under the rug and you don’t learn about it. Then the power consolidation started.
Even the most studied folks in the left will not make the claim that Marx was anything but a guide or an intent so don’t expect me to argue against it directly. I regret to the systems that actually developed and evolved and any recommended system should address their faults. Your three do not and I’ve not heard any that have.
Coops are perfectly allowed and acceptable in the current system. Literally no one is telling you that you cannot do this and there are many quiet communities doing it already. You simply are not going to be resourced for it unless it will provide something for the state. Neither would any corporation or sole proprietorship.
All of what you said is true but the collapse was so immediate that there was only cause. Additionally, the collapse immediately went away through collectivization. You can argue with myself and the socialist governments at the time but you are making excuses for them unasked.
I never claimed that modern leftists have not attempted to learn. The entire so called American left is a product of 60s radicals slowly realizing that the way to greater equity is through reform. It simply has capitalism at its base instead of group ownership.
Why are you on a nonprofit run economic alternative to Reddit if you don’t believe that the ultimate power in any market is consumer choice?
I was making a new point. You want to force people into your system. The current system based on capitalism allows for innovation. If your system is better at a smaller level, it will succeed.
I did address the definition of left in my language. I’m sorry you are so adversarial to not be coming to this conversation in good faith.
Was the platform created by a communist or was the code created by a communist? Which instance are we on again? Should we go ahead and institute the purges early then?
The ultimate issue with socialism is that the people are giving up economic power to the state. In a capitalist system, private ownership provides a check on the power of the state. You may claim that you are anti-state all you want but power consolidates. It does in a capitalist system as well. Government provides a check on private power there as well which is unacknowledged by you. What is the check on government power in a socialist system? What is the actual mechanism that ensures that one party does not become entrenched or the majority will not vote themselves a favorable position?
What is the recourse as a minority when the government decides you get less? What was the recourse for Muslims or Ukrainians when the party decided that Moscow was more important for food?
What is the recourse for Chinese minorities when the CCP decides enough capitalism to increase production is a benefit but not if they go against the party? (Fascism)
In a liberal system these types of events can still lead to violence and losers but there is an out for them. They have mobility and can leave the localized oppression. They purchase food from elsewhere or grow their own and not be beholden to the state.
More importantly, it provides competition and consequences for the state when it inevitably fails in some way. When the state fails in a socialist system, revolution happens because it is the only recourse. Then it is either genocide or radical change. Sure, you can say the state will never fail. Never is a long time and the state is made up of people.
The purge was not a joke and I don’t find it funny. I think your ideology should be as unwelcome as fascism because it is just as oppressive at its core economic level. From an economics and power standpoint, there is literally no difference between full government economic power and government economic power that uses corporations as proxy. Arguably, full government economic power is worse. There’s nothing inherent about socialism that says there is no racial component and you almost guarantee it when you institute majority rule and do not allow dissent.
The think tank has forgotten how to argue with the actual left because the US democratic party is what people view as socialism. They don’t even think about you anymore because people who study history know how flawed the forcible elimination of property rights is at a conceptual and functional level.
There is nothing inherently anti-capitalist about voluntary communes or coops as long as it remain voluntary, small-scale (To ensure choice), and deferent to the rules of fair play.
The good faith card was because I had already addressed Cowbee’s points in my language. They were not reading my language. Ignoring their comment would be actually moving goalposts.
I can imagine plenty of viable alternatives. There’s plenty of arguments to be made that the USSR was just as productive as the US on a per capita basis. They addressed the productivity issues of decentralized socialism through centralization.
The issue comes down to the lack of dissent within the system. Private ownership provides a natural counterbalance to the power of the state. Even in the most ideal of democratic socialist systems, there is no functional check on the power of the majority to vote in their own benefit over minorities. Every government system regardless of its economic base has resulted in rapid expansion without a check on power, internally or externally.
You are right that I cannot imagine a viable alternative. Neither can you. You just think you have but have not addressed the core power problem. Mark Fisher is great at framing away this issue but it still exists and is the core issue with true leftist ideologies.
I do have an issue with those famines. Famines resulting from the taking of private property by the existing power structure are perfect examples of how government control of private property results in famine for minorities.
I would prefer to not institutionalize it. Just my opinion.
Basic points that I have never seen in any book on socialism and you are yet to provide. Maybe you should be the one reading more instead of vaguely suggesting that I do. Maybe then you could provide them.
You are limiting the control of production to that which the few in government decide instead of literally anyone doing it. You seem to think that ownership in the West is limited strictly to the privileged and that labor is not compensated. That is where true leftist efforts have failed throughout history. The reason that laborers, engineers, and farmers in the West consistently vote against government economic control and never revolt is because they are the most compensated in society on average. This is especially true in times of hardship. The reason why people are so invested in their system is because 66% of people own their own homes. Anyone can buy enough machinery to make things and there is a robust market for handcrafted goods competing with those that are mass-produced. Additionally, no one company controls over 30% of the market in any sector so monopolies are not an issue in the eurocentric West.
The real issue with capitalism at its base is to keep a level playing field and healthy markets. That includes banning anticompetitive behaviors and good governance along with programs (That still use contracts at their base ultimately) to address externalities. The equivalent issue on the socialist side is to centrally plan literally everything as a state-sponsored monopoly that you just trust has your best interests at heart.
A government that controls production cannot be held accountable by those who need it to survive. It is a power imbalance baked into the system at a governance level. Additionally and most importantly, there is no counter to the power of government should it start to slide away from democratic accountability beyond the dissolution of the system as a whole. This is very consistent with history.
I have so far addressed all points so I am not sure why you are suggesting that I would not. I am starting to run out of energy here though. The burden of proof should not be on the existing proven system but instead that of the proposed radical change. An example of this would be the UBI tests that are occurring in various areas. In many of ways they are failing but at least they are trying to provide some proof before forcing through changes that have already been tried and failed in multiple countries and societies throughout the last hundred years; each progressing from trying decentralization, to consolidation, to ultimately a loss of trust in society in the centralized government and change back to private ownership.
You could even combine the efforts of the individual workers unions (Soviets) and address the production and starvation issues that the union of the soviets have been experiencing… Oh wait, that’s exactly what happened. This is why these arguments get dismissed out of hand. You are rewording very old arguments and claiming they are new ideas. I am not avoiding your question. I am addressing it with history.
The big difference between workers-led organizations in a consolidated capitalist system and a socialist one is worker choice and consent. In a socialist system, they have none or it fails very quickly.
So, I agree. Decentralization of the Soviets was immensely worse early after the revolution though so they centralized early. The CCP early in its creation had the same criticisms of the USSR resulting in a much longer attempt at decentralization and actual famine.
This thought experiment is based on an unrealistic view not only of natural history but also of the human condition and modern economics. It is based on a view of how easy the perceived human condition was before the existence of larger society.
“In prehistoric times our deal seems to have been not so bad. During the Old Stone Age (50,000 years ago) we were only few, food (game and plants) was abundant, and survival required only little working time and moderate efforts.”
This period of hunter-gatherers was largely the experience of 90% of the time looking for food. It was only the emergence of sustained and coordinated agriculture requiring public works that this started to change. Modern industrialized agriculture has enabled populations not sustainable in that text and requires a larger coordination of people than a small commune can support. That text does not cover larger governance and relies on high-output lands to sustain itself, let alone others. If you cannot enable specialization, you cannot scale nor can you provide the lifestyle people are accustomed to enjoying post-WWII.
There are already communes like this everywhere and nobody is saying that you cannot start one. The only issue is people trying to force others into this system. It starts based on oppression regardless of feasibility.
Not everyone wants to be responsible for every aspect of their lives. Can I assume you don’t want to participate in your own food production or waste disposal? Specialization of labor is an important component in this which most respectable leftist texts will at least attempt to answer, even if they cannot solve it without centralization of economic planning.
That’s certainly an unpopular opinion. You have three opinions that can manifest in terms of an ideal society that can cover the needs here.
One is where all the needs are provided by the state aka directed communism which is the exact system that typically immediately fails (USSR and CCP tried it) and leads to famine. Almost everyone is against this outcome and system.
The second is referring back to bartering which is arguably not more civilized by definition.
The third is a post scarcity world which is not currently the case. Even Star Trek had currency for things beyond their needs. Very few people think we are in a post scarcity world currently.
There is a fourth which is typically held by anarchists which requires people to give up power at even a local level and prejudice to magically disappear so also not a popular opinion in terms of people that think it is possible.
There’s also the high level narrative that this must overcome in which people are entitled to the value of their labor. This assures that this is not possible.
There’s a lot of discussion to be had here but congrats on finding an opinion that is truly unpopular.
The US does not recognize their authority due to judgements against US citizens concerning war crimes that the US is not signatory to. It’s an important legal distinction.
Americans ultimately do pay a lot of taxes in the end. It does towards all sorts of stuff at multiple levels but the greatest impact on individual lives is at the state level.
The media won’t give me great answers to this question and I think this I trust this community more, thus I want to know from you. Also, I have heard reports that Russia was winning the war, if that’s true, did the west miscalculate the situation by allowing diplomacy to take a backseat and allowing Ukraine to a large...
The propaganda is strong against the Western system. There is an argument to be made that the origins of this conflict are in energy finds in the Black Sea. Ukraine is uniquely positioned to take advantage of access to the European and Asian markets. Competition in these sections would threaten oligarch monopolies. These energy monopolies are granted to the oligarchs by Putin himself and this is the entire basis of power in the Russian Federation.
This is simultaneously the reason for the conflict and why the oligarchs have been lock step the entire way.
Government consultant here. The federal government does nothing if it is not military related or medical care in the Department of Veterans Affairs. Everything they produce is done via contract. That includes leadership which is queued up using consulting. Sure, they make the decisions but that’s not management or the visionary leadership people think it is. It’s all contract management.
The US is roughly the same percentage and it was definitely a comment from a US political frame. In the US they are simply more visible as they congregate in cities.
Inciting class war is old Marxist propaganda when the societies that followed it closely all reformed or collapsed. Those that reformed still have single party authoritarian systems following the fascist economic model. Either direction was precursed with a bloody revolution and ideological purges. It’s not a model I recommend you follow.
Labor minded westerners shifted to a democratic reform model almost exclusively. This is a great primer for that direction for the curious and those that want more academic context. youtu.be/eHYpcXWCkUM?si=Y-cj7IYtiAmP7crq
Production increase is the number one reason I see as giving ammunition to Ukraine as an overall good thing. Long term contacts to spy Ukraine and replenish greater stocks to be ready for a war in SE Asia. Not giving out the contacts and not giving to Ukraine is not going to make us more ready contrary to the America first narratives.
Additionally, ammunition does not last forever. It expires and becomes less effective. Everything needed replacing.
We need greater and smarter manufacturing at scale.
I’m so sorry you have to deal with this. I saw so many deaths and suffering due to this disease through records in the VA health system and it constantly enraged me. I can only imagine what it would do to someone impacted by it directly.
2020 was… truly unique. It was so hard to stay away from doom scrolling, and I (and many others) were pretty disillusioned by the sad fact that so much of our country legitimately supported the Orange Man. I didn’t get a wink of sleep the night of the election because I genuinely considered it to be a make or break decision...
It’s why we have primaries. People’s inability to understand the importance of primaries simultaneously means they don’t vote in them and hate the results. (On average)
Yeah, basically that. I’m back at work in Windows land on a Monday morning, and pondering what sadist at Microsoft included these features. It’s not hyperbole to say that the startup repair, and the troubleshooters in settings, have never fixed an issue I’ve encountered with Windows. Not even once. Is this typical?...
Palestinian health officials say Israeli warplanes struck a refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, killing at least 40 people and wounding dozens. Sunday's strike came as Israel vowed to press on with its offensive to crush the territory’s Hamas rulers, despite U.S. appeals for a pause in fighting to get aid to civilians....
You are welcome to blame colonial powers for setting up this situation from the remains of the Ottoman Empire but it is also worth going into why Israelis have been driven out of the rest of the world into Israel and the multiple wars conducted against them by powers claiming they have no right to exist. Those same claims are continued by Hamas and Iran and used to justify starting this current war. The same borders that instituted Israel also initially instituted Palestine until they conducted a war against them. That war was what caused these borders at question with the refugee camp.
It absolutely is worth looking into the history behind it.
Your comment does not address the fact that the above was disinformation. Not misinformation, but disinformation as it is intentionally misleading.
Misinformation and disinformation make strange bedfellows. Hamas is a terrorist organization and has an absolute provable track record for creating and applying both. What makes you think anything they say is any more accurate in this current conflict than it has been before?
The Democracy of the founding fathers was Greek Democracy, predicated upon a slave society, and restricted to only the elite. This is the society we live in today, even with our reforms towards direct representation. The system is inherently biased towards the election of elites and against the representation of the masses....
I’m not familiar with that record but I’m sure that if it is true it has something to do with the former title. People get emotional sometimes. That doesn’t make it policy.
Don’t reply if you’re not going to provide a source other than your word. My bias is that I’m formally trained in identifying mis and disinformation within large scale combat operations. Sorry that you assume that bias is not taken into account in a professional setting. I’ll just trust your “I know a guy” narrative.
Dear Lemmy, **why** Star Trek??
Every single large server in this federation has at least one Star Trek community. There is even an entire server dedicated to Star Trek....
Official history of the world (web.archive.org)
It's a simple world view (feddit.de)
venture capitalism goes brrr (feddit.de)
Whats your such opinion (discuss.tchncs.de)
US files war crime charges against Russians accused of torturing an American in the Ukraine invasion (www.themoscowtimes.com)
In the USA, can you lose your home even after it is 100% paid off?
Let’s say that you buy a home in cash and have 100% paid off. Could you still lose it somehow?
Who's winning the war in Ukraine?
The media won’t give me great answers to this question and I think this I trust this community more, thus I want to know from you. Also, I have heard reports that Russia was winning the war, if that’s true, did the west miscalculate the situation by allowing diplomacy to take a backseat and allowing Ukraine to a large...
They aren't, and I'm sick of being told they are (lemmy.world)
Personal space (startrek.website)
IRS be like (lemmy.ml)
I'm reminded of this after the hoopla at the Northern Border died down (lemmy.ca)
Bless their little hearts as they also blamed Canada again…
Watching Ukraine burn through ammo fighting Russia has the US Army rethinking how much it really needs for when war breaks out (www.businessinsider.com) Ukrainian
Long COVID really sucks (lemmy.zip)
Americans of Lemmy, what is your approach to next year's election?
2020 was… truly unique. It was so hard to stay away from doom scrolling, and I (and many others) were pretty disillusioned by the sad fact that so much of our country legitimately supported the Orange Man. I didn’t get a wink of sleep the night of the election because I genuinely considered it to be a make or break decision...
Stayin' Alive (feddit.de)
Has Windows startup repair or a troubleshooter ever fixed your issue even once?
Yeah, basically that. I’m back at work in Windows land on a Monday morning, and pondering what sadist at Microsoft included these features. It’s not hyperbole to say that the startup repair, and the troubleshooters in settings, have never fixed an issue I’ve encountered with Windows. Not even once. Is this typical?...
Squad goals? (ttrpg.network)
Communist Filth/Capitalist Filth (lemmy.ml)
Warplanes strike Gaza refugee camp as Israel rejects US push for a pause in fighting (apnews.com)
Palestinian health officials say Israeli warplanes struck a refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, killing at least 40 people and wounding dozens. Sunday's strike came as Israel vowed to press on with its offensive to crush the territory’s Hamas rulers, despite U.S. appeals for a pause in fighting to get aid to civilians....
Neo-Nazis and the Far-Right Are Trying to Hijack Pro-Palestine Protests (www.vice.com)
Neo-Nazis are showing up at protests in an attempt to push anti-Jewish conspiracy theories and tropes into the mainstream.
The suffering is inherent, and intentional to RULE system (lemmy.tf)
The Democracy of the founding fathers was Greek Democracy, predicated upon a slave society, and restricted to only the elite. This is the society we live in today, even with our reforms towards direct representation. The system is inherently biased towards the election of elites and against the representation of the masses....