If Marx turns out to be right...

[You-Gi-Owe]

So this question has been kind of mulling around in my head for a while. So, if you're not a socialist, this question goes out to you.

So, if in the long run, Marx's materialist conception of history turns out to be accurate, and the present capitalist society gets overthrown by a "spontaneous"¹ revolution, and some new socialist society replaces it, based on a genuine common ownership of the mans of production, what would you do?

For the purposes of this question, let's say that this future society is somewhere in the middle ground between heaven on earth, and the cesspit of historical Marxist-Leninist states. On average, everyone is at least as happy and free as they were in the "good times" before the revolution. Fears about cultural or economic stagnation prove to be unfounded, and socialism continues where capitalism left off in increasing the productive forces of human civilization and applies what exist already in a more efficient, conscious manner, just as capitalism had improved from feudalism.

So, let's not turn this into a thread about whether that's possible or not, since that's been done over and over again on this forum since its inception. Instead, I'm more interested in what you would do if socialism turns out to be not so bad, or even good. Especially if you're heavily committed to opposing the very idea.

To start out, I'm STRONGLY, perhaps even VIOLENTLY, opposed to the socialist/communist model. In other words, the guy that you asked to comment on this idea of "what if?".

I have a firm set of beliefs. I'm a something of a rabble-rouser, too. It's a hobby. If things turn out okay or good, I'll still be protesting how much better they could be without the government judging if I'm contributing according to my abilities and judging what to give me according to my needs. So, what will this socialist society do about protesters? Will my needs still be met or will I be punished? Would I be declared an enemy of the state or mentally incompetant?

[The Floridian Coast]

Well since I am pro-socialism, I'd hand out a lot of "I told you so's" to people. Then I'd probably enjoy my new socialist life and find many different jobs to do, never staying with one thing too long, since that was another Marxist utopian idea.

[Risna]

I would probaly just get up and dance naked in the street

[You-Gi-Owe]

Well since I am pro-socialism, I'd hand out a lot of "I told you so's" to people. Then I'd probably enjoy my new socialist life and find many different jobs to do, never staying with one thing too long, since that was another Marxist utopian idea.

Are you good at many jobs?

[Staenwald]

Well since I am pro-socialism, I'd hand out a lot of "I told you so's" to people. Then I'd probably enjoy my new socialist life and find many different jobs to do, never staying with one thing too long, since that was another Marxist utopian idea.

you can do that successfully in capitalism....with jobs requiring little qualification. Being in a socialist society doesn't make you qualified to be a brain surgeon, and structural engineer, a good artist, and theoretical physicist, a talented athlete, and interpreter...am I making it clear? anyway it's more likely in a socialist society with a high enough population that you are only allowed to choose one complicated job to train for, it would be unfair for you to get more education than other people, and also tasks really would be menial in a world where the division of labour has widened even further- perhaps explains why Marx wanted 8 hour days for all workers, if not less. also, don't expect to get a choice of job, they'll most likely put you where you are needed, or rather- you'd choose of your own nobly altruistic self to fill any gap there is, regardless of it's quality.

[Kongra]

...don't expect to get a choice of job, they'll most likely put you where you are needed, or rather- you'd choose of your own nobly altruistic self to fill any gap there is, regardless of it's quality.

Capitalism already does this. The free market gives the illusion of choice. You can only go where you are needed (ie. job openings you are qualified for) and the very nature of the market itself means you are filling a gap (job openings in general). Instead of the state deciding where you work, it's just the owners of capitalism. Theoretically, you have the choice to not work if the job doesn't suit you but in reality when your back is to the wall you will take that McDonald's job because you have to eat.

[Sibirsky]

Hold on,

I changed my mind.

I'll become a high-ranked party cadre in the KGB or GRU, something in the state security apparatus. I'll do my best to collaborate with the people at the Gosplan Office and elaborate close relations with other people in strategic positions.

Then, I'll organize a coup.

*hands over an envelope containing $100,000*

You accept cash, right comrade?

[Rofltoe]

So this question has been kind of mulling around in my head for a while. So, if you're not a socialist, this question goes out to you.

So, if in the long run, Marx's materialist conception of history turns out to be accurate, and the present capitalist society gets overthrown by a "spontaneous"¹ revolution, and some new socialist society replaces it, based on a genuine common ownership of the mans of production, what would you do?

For the purposes of this question, let's say that this future society is somewhere in the middle ground between heaven on earth, and the cesspit of historical Marxist-Leninist states. On average, everyone is at least as happy and free as they were in the "good times" before the revolution. Fears about cultural or economic stagnation prove to be unfounded, and socialism continues where capitalism left off in increasing the productive forces of human civilization and applies what exist already in a more efficient, conscious manner, just as capitalism had improved from feudalism.

So, let's not turn this into a thread about whether that's possible or not, since that's been done over and over again on this forum since its inception. Instead, I'm more interested in what you would do if socialism turns out to be not so bad, or even good. Especially if you're heavily committed to opposing the very idea.

In a situtaion like the one you described life would be amazing ... everyone would be equal in the eyes of everyone , and the economy will thrive , along with the arrival of technology from every state on earth to every state on earth , I'll just live quietly , the whole concept of the socialism is that in the end there will be no government and the people will govern themselves, so I'll just live my life and I wont harm or insult anyone around me.

[Sibirsky]

...don't expect to get a choice of job, they'll most likely put you where you are needed, or rather- you'd choose of your own nobly altruistic self to fill any gap there is, regardless of it's quality.

Capitalism already does this. The free market gives the illusion of choice. You can only go where you are needed (ie. job openings you are qualified for) and the very nature of the market itself means you are filling a gap (job openings in general). Instead of the state deciding where you work, it's just the owners of capitalism. Theoretically, you have the choice to not work if the job doesn't suit you but in reality when your back is to the wall you will take that McDonald's job because you have to eat.

Owners of capitalism? Capitalists. They don't decide what openings there are. The consumers decide that.

You have a choice in the field of study you pursue. The market has an effect on making that decision.

[Staenwald]

...don't expect to get a choice of job, they'll most likely put you where you are needed, or rather- you'd choose of your own nobly altruistic self to fill any gap there is, regardless of it's quality.

Capitalism already does this. The free market gives the illusion of choice. You can only go where you are needed (ie. job openings you are qualified for) and the very nature of the market itself means you are filling a gap (job openings in general). Instead of the state deciding where you work, it's just the owners of capitalism. Theoretically, you have the choice to not work if the job doesn't suit you but in reality when your back is to the wall you will take that McDonald's job because you have to eat.

Entrepreneurship is encouraged in capitalism, no such thing is encouraged under a system of 'each according to his ability, each according to his need'.

[Sibirsky]

Anyway, to answer Trotskylvania. Assuming I was not killed in my resistance alongside of GeneralHaNor or The Soviet Technocracy, I would continue doing what I'm doing, only this time for a publicly owned employer.

[Staenwald]

Anyway, to answer Trotskylvania. Assuming I was not killed in my resistance alongside of GeneralHaNor or The Soviet Technocracy, I would continue doing what I'm doing, only this time for a publicly owned employer.

its' not like we'd have a choice....hey..wanna get out of this commie place, we'll create a band of dissidents and escape to an island somewhere and create the perfect free market and go back and destroy them?

[Josh Sinister]

I would be fucking pissed off!
That'd mean no more goddam fun and (obviously) less freedom!
"Lounging around" as a federal offense? FUCK DAT' MESS!

[Trotskylvania]

I would be fucking pissed off!
That'd mean no more goddam fun and (obviously) less freedom!
"Lounging around" as a federal offense? FUCK DAT' MESS!

I don't know where you implied any of that from the OP.

[Sibirsky]

Anyway, to answer Trotskylvania. Assuming I was not killed in my resistance alongside of GeneralHaNor or The Soviet Technocracy, I would continue doing what I'm doing, only this time for a publicly owned employer.

its' not like we'd have a choice....hey..wanna get out of this commie place, we'll create a band of dissidents and escape to an island somewhere and create the perfect free market and go back and destroy them?

I'm down.

[Josh Sinister]

I would be fucking pissed off!
That'd mean no more goddam fun and (obviously) less freedom!
"Lounging around" as a federal offense? FUCK DAT' MESS!

I don't know where you implied any of that from the OP.

The "Lounging around" joke was a reference to Stalinist history. They'd kill those who weren't "efficient".

[Nazis in Space]

So this question has been kind of mulling around in my head for a while. So, if you're not a socialist, this question goes out to you.

So, if in the long run, Marx's materialist conception of history turns out to be accurate, and the present capitalist society gets overthrown by a "spontaneous"¹ revolution, and some new socialist society replaces it, based on a genuine common ownership of the mans of production, what would you do?

For the purposes of this question, let's say that this future society is somewhere in the middle ground between heaven on earth, and the cesspit of historical Marxist-Leninist states. On average, everyone is at least as happy and free as they were in the "good times" before the revolution. Fears about cultural or economic stagnation prove to be unfounded, and socialism continues where capitalism left off in increasing the productive forces of human civilization and applies what exist already in a more efficient, conscious manner, just as capitalism had improved from feudalism.

So, let's not turn this into a thread about whether that's possible or not, since that's been done over and over again on this forum since its inception. Instead, I'm more interested in what you would do if socialism turns out to be not so bad, or even good. Especially if you're heavily committed to opposing the very idea.

the likelihood that marx could predict the future is the same as the likelihood that nostradamus could predict the future.

but if what you project happened, everyone would be happy about it because it would happen gradually and naturally.

To be entirely fair here - as someone who's repeatedly pointed out that Marxism is inherently immoral, an intellectually-pretty highway to totalitarianism and misery, and that Pol Pot actually gave us the closest approximation of communism (Or socialism, if you prefer) as envisioned in the manifesto -, Marx' methodology is way ahead of Nostradamus. Nostradamus had fever dreams and wrote them down, following which a screaming horde of retarded fanboys tried to make sense of them. Marx' analysis of the present to predict the future, while evidently incorrect (As admitted by the socialist/ communist elites in the 1900- 1920 timeframe) was actually a lot closer to home. He saw the regular cycles of economic boom & bust, and he saw how they got worse with every iteration. Predicting that eventually, the whole system would come down in shambles was a naive, but not altogether baseless suggestion.* Likewise, his prediction that the demand for unskilled labour would create a shape- and formless proletariat was, again, a naive, but not altogether baseless suggestion at the time he wrote his mental masturbations - because that was, largely, exactly what was happening, unskilled labour outcompeting the trained-in-detail masters of the old industries. The process of specialisation, the rise of the engineering profession to the top of the respect- and wagechain, the diversification of the proletariat into a shitton of different levels and wage classes, all that happened either simultaneous to Marx (With him not paying a whole lot of attention, preferring to look at the past few decades during which he grew up, a forgivable mistake), or after him.

Marx still made a number of errors that were utterly retarded even when he wrote them down, but those (Particularly concerning deurbanisation, and his apparently fetishist ideas concerning the lifestyle of the upper classes), but for the most part, they're not relevant to his predictions of the future. The only exception to this would be his prediction of 'The State Owns Everything!' and 'No Free Media Or Transportation, Ever!' somehow, magically, for no particular reason whatsoever, leading to a stateless society, rather than Josef Stalin. A prediction that, like Nostradamus', is endlessly repeated by a screaming horde of retarded fanboys.**

* What eventually softened the cycle into something we can generally cope with pretty well (See the harmlessness of the latest recession) was, amusingly, the sucecss of the left in deteriorating the military- and police-backed authoritarianism of the extant regimes to the point where unions could freely form and negotiate wages, plus the introduction of social security and such

** Though past experiences make me believe that Trotskylvania does not belong to them, and his view on communism doesn't have a whole lot to do with Marxism. Not that I'm entirely sure on what his view on communism is, but I believe he's in the past freely acknowledged the USSR as simultaneously bad, and a socialist/ communist regime. He might belong to the Dubcek line or so. Dunno.

[Nazis in Space]

Oh, and as for the actual topic of the thread, I see no reason to oppose a system in which I'm no worse of than I was in the previous one.

Obviously, I find the idea of such being possible under Marxism laughable at best, but hey, if we get magic to work... I ain't gonna start a counterrevolution if I'm well fed and can shout about the local commissar being an asshole without being shot. My opposition to socialism, communism/ whatever flavour stems from the effects thereof, not their names, and if they actually - against historical precedence and Marx' own, stated ideals for his beautiful society, but whatever - work out, let 'em.

[Fongbai]

Socialism would only work continuously if every country is also a socialist. Otherwise they wouldn't be able to compete in the world if everyone is getting richer by the minute and a socialist country stays poor the whole time. Take China before they allowed trade and after they allowed trade. Where are they now?

[Mongolian Khanate]

Hold on,

I changed my mind.

I'll become a high-ranked party cadre in the KGB or GRU, something in the state security apparatus. I'll do my best to collaborate with the people at the Gosplan Office and elaborate close relations with other people in strategic positions.

Then, I'll organize a coup.

*hands over an envelope containing $100,000*

You accept cash, right comrade?

We can certainly work something out

[Sibirsky]

*hands over an envelope containing $100,000*

You accept cash, right comrade?

We can certainly work something out

It's good to know low people* in high places.
*I don't mean any offense by this. Simply that you're willing to accept my... donation.

[Mongolian Khanate]

We can certainly work something out

It's good to know low people* in high places.
*I don't mean any offense by this. Simply that you're willing to accept my... donation.

Hey, I'm the sword and shield of the people

[Meryuma]

Yes, I was putting forward a hypothetical situation for your ideal world (One without taxes).
If healthcare is "Too damned expensive", how will total privatisation help? If you had a terminal illness, would you not use any form of government assistance to be able to pay for the treatment?
I'm pointing out that without these breaches of your self-assigned rights, these essential services would not be able to exist (At least, for the vast majority of people, including yourself).

But I do agree, I like something in return for the taxes I pay.

At this point I do not have answers, I don't know what my ideal society would look like, or how (if at all) it would function.

Your argument is based on Appeal to Benefit/Pragmatism. But I reject these arguments as they do not account for what is "right". Lot's of abhorrent things are pragmatic, and if I cared for what works, I would embrace evil.

My opposition is based not in what I would like to see, but rather what I cannot abide. The current society is not a voluntary one, therefore it is invalid, unethical and immoral. It does not deserve to exist.

Bad. Fucking. Argument.

You are basically conceding the opponent's point about the affordability of health care in a freed market, even though it's fucking easy to argue against, while making an appeal to a deontological ethics that you've never even tried to justify.

Health care would be far more affordable without licensing and patents, due to greatly increased competition lowering prices.

I'd rebel, and would most likely be put to death. I'm morally opposed to everything communism and socialism stand for. Free market forever.

Free markets and socialism aren't incompatible. Look up mutualist anarchism.

...don't expect to get a choice of job, they'll most likely put you where you are needed, or rather- you'd choose of your own nobly altruistic self to fill any gap there is, regardless of it's quality.

Capitalism already does this. The free market gives the illusion of choice. You can only go where you are needed (ie. job openings you are qualified for) and the very nature of the market itself means you are filling a gap (job openings in general). Instead of the state deciding where you work, it's just the owners of capitalism. Theoretically, you have the choice to not work if the job doesn't suit you but in reality when your back is to the wall you will take that McDonald's job because you have to eat.

We don't have a free market. We have artificial scarcity, legal privilege for corporations, subsidies, barriers to entry, State monopolies and restrictions on labor organizing. A market that has been completely freed of the state would be, if coupled with a revolutionary change in the nature of property, far more socialist then capitalist.

[Nazis in Space]

Health care would be far more affordable without licensing and patents, due to greatly increased competition lowering prices.

You do realise that patents run out after twenty- to a maximum of twenty-five years, yes? There's drug manufacturers who specialise solely on copying drugs whose patents have run out - Ratiopharm does this -, and then selling them for a fraction of the price the original manufacturer demanded.

The competition is already there, I'm afraid.

Additionally, there's actually a great deal of variation concerning the healthcare costs between countries - between countries of otherwise similar economic performance, living standards, etc. Since patent/ licencing laws are internationally agreed upon standards, it stands to reason that they can't be responsible for the obscene healthcare costs in certain countries - after all, they aren't in others.

Curiously, drugs make up a minority of my healthcare costs - the majority - the vast majority - comes from the monthy payments to my insurer, and from routine visits to my doctors. Now, this is of course anecdotal evidence, but I'd strongly suggest first figuring out how your annual costs are divided before making random claims.

[Dainer]

I don't like socialism because I think it doesn't work. If it ever turned out out to work, I guess I'd better recognize reality instead of wasting time with ideological bitching.