Anti-Socialism Thread

[Rost Dreadnorramus]

Not 3 hours and the latest post is from a Mod warning someone,

There might be a chance of this staying open for longer then 3 hours, though this is 2020, a couple of minutes is plenty of time for stupid to happen.

[Sanghyeok]

GDP is rather silly measure anyways...I doubt the majority of people in Qatar (GDP per capita of over 100,000) are enjoying a good standard of life.

Qatar has a pretty high HDI score (0.848) and is 29th on the World Happiness Report. You are right that GDP does not always correlate with standard of living, but it is a good indicator.

For how many people? The majority of people living in Qatar- migrant workers- are definitely not enjoying the multimillion dollar lifestyle that the rich can.

[Eurasies]

They don't top the charts, but they're still very close to the top

Not really.
QOL: US-15, UK-19 Canada-21.
Life Expectancy: Canada-15, UK-27, US- 37
Corruption: US-23, Canada-12, UK-12
Only in nominal GDP are they all in the top 10.

And the remember who's being measured. Having a higher quality of life than Uruguay is not really a thing to be proud of.

What?

Do you know that Uruguay is really a fairly developed country?

[-Ra-]

The topic of discussion here was socialism, not what country is the best. You mentioned that many countries had it better than the US. I said that that was true, but all of these countries are socialist anyway. You shifted the goalposts first. By listing out the most popular countries you've literally proved my point that capitalism is inherently the best economic system, since all of the countries you listed bar one are capitalist.

Note how you entirely dropped the point about how the worst countries are all capitalist (we'll be nice and cut out the ones in a war).By your own horrible and simplistic understanding, notwithstanding the fact that you don't seem to understand how those countries became wealthy in the first place, that would debunk your argument.

No, it wouldn't. I suppose you could understand the worst countries in the world as capitalist, since they all have private property, but those countries certainly do not have free-market economies and are dominated by illiberal government cartels. These countries are by and large very anti-business and awful for capital investment. Not to mention that many of those countries are haunted by the legacy of socialism and socialist leaders, anyway.

Once again, thank you for proving my point.

[Sanghyeok]

Note how you entirely dropped the point about how the worst countries are all capitalist (we'll be nice and cut out the ones in a war).By your own horrible and simplistic understanding, notwithstanding the fact that you don't seem to understand how those countries became wealthy in the first place, that would debunk your argument.

We've also left out a major point: a lot of these so called "developed" countries became prosperous due to imperialism.

[Punished UMN]

Note how you entirely dropped the point about how the worst countries are all capitalist (we'll be nice and cut out the ones in a war).By your own horrible and simplistic understanding, notwithstanding the fact that you don't seem to understand how those countries became wealthy in the first place, that would debunk your argument.

No, it wouldn't. I suppose you could understand the worst countries in the world as capitalist, since they all have private property, but those countries certainly do not have free-market economies and are dominated by illiberal government cartels. These countries are by and large very anti-business and awful for capital investment. Not to mention that many of those countries are haunted by the legacy of socialism and socialist leaders, anyway.

Once again, thank you for proving my point.

Many countries were better off under socialism than they are now.

[The New California Republic]

Not 3 hours and the latest post is from a Mod warning someone,

It shouldn't really be any surprise that a warning was dished out, as the person in question was advocating sending people to death camps no less...

[-Ra-]

Note how you entirely dropped the point about how the worst countries are all capitalist (we'll be nice and cut out the ones in a war).By your own horrible and simplistic understanding, notwithstanding the fact that you don't seem to understand how those countries became wealthy in the first place, that would debunk your argument.

We've also left out a major point: a lot of these so called "developed" countries became prosperous due to imperialism.

You mean that thing Marx advocated for?

[Disgraces]

Fuck capitalism. All my homies advocate for a very regulated mixed economy with economic interventionism.

[Aggicificicerous]

This looks like a Reddit page honestly.

The irony being that Reddit is super socialist atm.

Seriously, you couldn't go 1 day without seeing Bernie's face on the front page when he was running.

Most of Reddit has no idea what socialism is. I suspect the reason behind Sanders's popularity is that many Americans, raised on a diet of conservatism and bland centrism, finally saw someone unapologetically on the left, and it blew their minds. They either rallied around him as their spokesman, or condemned him as a socialist, when he's just a leftwing politician.

[Sanghyeok]

Most of Reddit has no idea what socialism is. I suspect the reason behind Sanders's popularity is that many Americans, raised on a diet of conservatism and bland centrism, finally saw someone unapologetically on the left, and it blew their minds. They either rallied around him as their spokesman, or condemned him as a socialist, when he's just a leftwing politician.

He's a social democrat at best, which makes the response to him even more amazing.

[Kowani]

Not really.
QOL: US-15, UK-19 Canada-21.
Life Expectancy: Canada-15, UK-27, US- 37
Corruption: US-23, Canada-12, UK-12
Only in nominal GDP are they all in the top 10.

And the remember who's being measured. Having a higher quality of life than Uruguay is not really a thing to be proud of.

What?

Do you know that Uruguay is really a fairly developed country?

Yes, ranked 57th in the world, what an achievment.

Note how you entirely dropped the point about how the worst countries are all capitalist (we'll be nice and cut out the ones in a war).By your own horrible and simplistic understanding, notwithstanding the fact that you don't seem to understand how those countries became wealthy in the first place, that would debunk your argument.

No, it wouldn't. I suppose you could understand the worst countries in the world as capitalist, since they all have private property, but those countries certainly do not have free-market economies and are dominated by illiberal government cartels.

Ra: "I'm not pro-freemarketeerism"
Also Ra: "These countries don't have free markets so they don't count."
Vulgar Libertarianism is a hell of a drug.

These countries are by and large very anti-business and awful for capital investment.

You heard it here folks, Bangladesh and Nigeria are definitely not places you should invest in.

Not to mention that many of those countries are haunted by the legacy of socialism and socialist leaders, anyway.

The countries at the bottom of all those lists (Nigeria, Sudan, the Central African Republic, and Niger) never had a socialist government in their history.

Once again, thank you for proving my point.[/quote]

[Sanghyeok]

The countries at the bottom of all those lists (Nigeria, Sudan, the Central African Republic, and Niger) never had a socialist government in their history.

Once again, thank you for proving my point.

Those countries, have, however, sufferered through British and French imperialism.

[Punished UMN]

We've also left out a major point: a lot of these so called "developed" countries became prosperous due to imperialism.

You mean that thing Marx advocated for?

Okay, Dennis, you really need to get better talking points.

[-Ra-]

You mean that thing Marx advocated for?

Okay, Dennis, you really need to get better talking points.

Source:

In recent years, scholars have devoted less attention to the debates on colonialism within the Marxist tradition. This reflects the waning influence of Marxism in the academy and in political practice. Marxism, however, has influenced both post-colonial theory and anti-colonial independence movements around the world. Marxists have drawn attention to the material basis of European political expansion and developed concepts that help explain the persistence of economic exploitation after the end of direct political rule.

Although Marx never developed a theory of colonialism, his analysis of capitalism emphasized its inherent tendency to expand in search of new markets. In his classic works such as The Communist Manifesto, Grundrisse, and Capital, Marx predicted that the bourgeoisie would continue to create a global market and undermine both local and national barriers to its own expansion. Expansion is a necessary product of the core dynamic of capitalism: overproduction. Competition among producers drives them to cut wages, which in turn leads to a crisis of under-consumption. The only way to prevent economic collapse is to find new markets to absorb excess consumer goods. From a Marxist perspective, some form of imperialism is inevitable. By exporting population to resource rich foreign territories, a nation creates a market for industrial goods and a reliable source of natural resources. Alternately, weaker countries can face the choice of either voluntarily admitting foreign products that will undermine domestic industry or submitting to political domination, which will accomplish the same end.

In a series of newspaper articles published in the 1850s in the New York Daily Tribune, Marx specifically discussed the impact of British colonialism in India. His analysis was consistent with his general theory of political and economic change. He described India as an essentially feudal society experiencing the painful process of modernization. According to Marx, however, Indian “feudalism” was a distinctive form of economic organization. He reached this conclusion because he believed (incorrectly) that agricultural land in India was owned communally. Marx used the concept of “Oriental despotism” to describe a specific type of class domination that used the state’s power of taxation in order to extract resources from the peasantry. According to Marx, oriental despotism emerged in India because agricultural productivity depended on large-scale public works such as irrigation that could only be financed by the state. This meant that the state could not be easily replaced by a more decentralized system of authority. In Western Europe, feudal property could be transformed gradually into privately owned, alienable property in land. In India, communal land ownership made this impossible, thereby blocking the development of commercial agriculture and free markets. Since “Oriental despotism” inhibited the indigenous development of economic modernization, British domination became the agent of economic modernization.

Marx’s analysis of colonialism as a progressive force bringing modernization to a backward feudal society sounds like a transparent rationalization for foreign domination. His account of British domination, however, reflects the same ambivalence that he shows towards capitalism in Europe. In both cases, Marx recognizes the immense suffering brought about during the transition from feudal to bourgeois society while insisting that the transition is both necessary and ultimately progressive. He argues that the penetration of foreign commerce will cause a social revolution in India. For Marx, this upheaval has both positive and negative consequences. When peasants lose their traditional livelihoods, there is a great deal of human suffering, but he also points out that traditional village communities are hardly idyllic; they are sites of caste oppression, slavery, misery, and cruelty. The first stage of the modernization process is entirely negative, because poor people pay heavy taxation to support British rule and endure the economic upheaval that results from the glut of cheaply produced English cotton. Eventually, however, British merchants begin to realize that Indians cannot pay for imported cloth or British administration if they don’t efficiently produce goods to trade, which provides an incentive for British investment in production and infrastructure. Even though Marx believed that British rule was motivated by greed and exercised through cruelty, he felt it was still the agent of progress. Thus, Marx’s discussion of British rule in India has three dimensions: an account of the progressive character of foreign rule, a critique of the human suffering involved, and a concluding argument that British rule must be temporary if the progressive potential is to be realized.

TLDR: Marx supported colonialism and imperialism because he thought it would further his political objectives.

[Punished UMN]

Okay, Dennis, you really need to get better talking points.

Source:

In recent years, scholars have devoted less attention to the debates on colonialism within the Marxist tradition. This reflects the waning influence of Marxism in the academy and in political practice. Marxism, however, has influenced both post-colonial theory and anti-colonial independence movements around the world. Marxists have drawn attention to the material basis of European political expansion and developed concepts that help explain the persistence of economic exploitation after the end of direct political rule.

Although Marx never developed a theory of colonialism, his analysis of capitalism emphasized its inherent tendency to expand in search of new markets. In his classic works such as The Communist Manifesto, Grundrisse, and Capital, Marx predicted that the bourgeoisie would continue to create a global market and undermine both local and national barriers to its own expansion. Expansion is a necessary product of the core dynamic of capitalism: overproduction. Competition among producers drives them to cut wages, which in turn leads to a crisis of under-consumption. The only way to prevent economic collapse is to find new markets to absorb excess consumer goods. From a Marxist perspective, some form of imperialism is inevitable. By exporting population to resource rich foreign territories, a nation creates a market for industrial goods and a reliable source of natural resources. Alternately, weaker countries can face the choice of either voluntarily admitting foreign products that will undermine domestic industry or submitting to political domination, which will accomplish the same end.

In a series of newspaper articles published in the 1850s in the New York Daily Tribune, Marx specifically discussed the impact of British colonialism in India. His analysis was consistent with his general theory of political and economic change. He described India as an essentially feudal society experiencing the painful process of modernization. According to Marx, however, Indian “feudalism” was a distinctive form of economic organization. He reached this conclusion because he believed (incorrectly) that agricultural land in India was owned communally. Marx used the concept of “Oriental despotism” to describe a specific type of class domination that used the state’s power of taxation in order to extract resources from the peasantry. According to Marx, oriental despotism emerged in India because agricultural productivity depended on large-scale public works such as irrigation that could only be financed by the state. This meant that the state could not be easily replaced by a more decentralized system of authority. In Western Europe, feudal property could be transformed gradually into privately owned, alienable property in land. In India, communal land ownership made this impossible, thereby blocking the development of commercial agriculture and free markets. Since “Oriental despotism” inhibited the indigenous development of economic modernization, British domination became the agent of economic modernization.

Marx’s analysis of colonialism as a progressive force bringing modernization to a backward feudal society sounds like a transparent rationalization for foreign domination. His account of British domination, however, reflects the same ambivalence that he shows towards capitalism in Europe. In both cases, Marx recognizes the immense suffering brought about during the transition from feudal to bourgeois society while insisting that the transition is both necessary and ultimately progressive. He argues that the penetration of foreign commerce will cause a social revolution in India. For Marx, this upheaval has both positive and negative consequences. When peasants lose their traditional livelihoods, there is a great deal of human suffering, but he also points out that traditional village communities are hardly idyllic; they are sites of caste oppression, slavery, misery, and cruelty. The first stage of the modernization process is entirely negative, because poor people pay heavy taxation to support British rule and endure the economic upheaval that results from the glut of cheaply produced English cotton. Eventually, however, British merchants begin to realize that Indians cannot pay for imported cloth or British administration if they don’t efficiently produce goods to trade, which provides an incentive for British investment in production and infrastructure. Even though Marx believed that British rule was motivated by greed and exercised through cruelty, he felt it was still the agent of progress. Thus, Marx’s discussion of British rule in India has three dimensions: an account of the progressive character of foreign rule, a critique of the human suffering involved, and a concluding argument that British rule must be temporary if the progressive potential is to be realized.

TLDR: Marx supported colonialism and imperialism because he thought it would further his political objectives.

So?

[Cordel One]

This thread would be a nightmare for anyone allergic to straw, misinformation, and other logical fallacies/

[-Ra-]

Source:


TLDR: Marx supported colonialism and imperialism because he thought it would further his political objectives.

So?

I thought you lot were all about colonialism and imperialism being bad...

Leftism is hypocrisy? Who'd've thought?

[Punished UMN]

So?

I thought you lot were all about colonialism and imperialism being bad...

Leftism is hypocrisy? Who'd've thought?

Since when am I Karl Marx?

[Disgraces]

Okay, Dennis, you really need to get better talking points.

Source:

In recent years, scholars have devoted less attention to the debates on colonialism within the Marxist tradition. This reflects the waning influence of Marxism in the academy and in political practice. Marxism, however, has influenced both post-colonial theory and anti-colonial independence movements around the world. Marxists have drawn attention to the material basis of European political expansion and developed concepts that help explain the persistence of economic exploitation after the end of direct political rule.

Although Marx never developed a theory of colonialism, his analysis of capitalism emphasized its inherent tendency to expand in search of new markets. In his classic works such as The Communist Manifesto, Grundrisse, and Capital, Marx predicted that the bourgeoisie would continue to create a global market and undermine both local and national barriers to its own expansion. Expansion is a necessary product of the core dynamic of capitalism: overproduction. Competition among producers drives them to cut wages, which in turn leads to a crisis of under-consumption. The only way to prevent economic collapse is to find new markets to absorb excess consumer goods. From a Marxist perspective, some form of imperialism is inevitable. By exporting population to resource rich foreign territories, a nation creates a market for industrial goods and a reliable source of natural resources. Alternately, weaker countries can face the choice of either voluntarily admitting foreign products that will undermine domestic industry or submitting to political domination, which will accomplish the same end.

In a series of newspaper articles published in the 1850s in the New York Daily Tribune, Marx specifically discussed the impact of British colonialism in India. His analysis was consistent with his general theory of political and economic change. He described India as an essentially feudal society experiencing the painful process of modernization. According to Marx, however, Indian “feudalism” was a distinctive form of economic organization. He reached this conclusion because he believed (incorrectly) that agricultural land in India was owned communally. Marx used the concept of “Oriental despotism” to describe a specific type of class domination that used the state’s power of taxation in order to extract resources from the peasantry. According to Marx, oriental despotism emerged in India because agricultural productivity depended on large-scale public works such as irrigation that could only be financed by the state. This meant that the state could not be easily replaced by a more decentralized system of authority. In Western Europe, feudal property could be transformed gradually into privately owned, alienable property in land. In India, communal land ownership made this impossible, thereby blocking the development of commercial agriculture and free markets. Since “Oriental despotism” inhibited the indigenous development of economic modernization, British domination became the agent of economic modernization.

Marx’s analysis of colonialism as a progressive force bringing modernization to a backward feudal society sounds like a transparent rationalization for foreign domination. His account of British domination, however, reflects the same ambivalence that he shows towards capitalism in Europe. In both cases, Marx recognizes the immense suffering brought about during the transition from feudal to bourgeois society while insisting that the transition is both necessary and ultimately progressive. He argues that the penetration of foreign commerce will cause a social revolution in India. For Marx, this upheaval has both positive and negative consequences. When peasants lose their traditional livelihoods, there is a great deal of human suffering, but he also points out that traditional village communities are hardly idyllic; they are sites of caste oppression, slavery, misery, and cruelty. The first stage of the modernization process is entirely negative, because poor people pay heavy taxation to support British rule and endure the economic upheaval that results from the glut of cheaply produced English cotton. Eventually, however, British merchants begin to realize that Indians cannot pay for imported cloth or British administration if they don’t efficiently produce goods to trade, which provides an incentive for British investment in production and infrastructure. Even though Marx believed that British rule was motivated by greed and exercised through cruelty, he felt it was still the agent of progress. Thus, Marx’s discussion of British rule in India has three dimensions: an account of the progressive character of foreign rule, a critique of the human suffering involved, and a concluding argument that British rule must be temporary if the progressive potential is to be realized.

TLDR: Marx supported colonialism and imperialism because he thought it would further his political objectives.

Obviously

[Disgraces]

So?

I thought you lot were all about colonialism and imperialism being bad...

Leftism is hypocrisy? Who'd've thought?

You do realize the left wing ain't all communism?

[-Ra-]

-snip-

You: Capitalism is bad!
Also you: Look, here are all of the countries that have thrived off of capitalism! Isn't capitalism bad guys? Right? Right?

[Albrenia]

I thought you lot were all about colonialism and imperialism being bad...

Leftism is hypocrisy? Who'd've thought?

Since when am I Karl Marx?

Nice beard, if so!

[Kowani]

-snip-

You: Capitalism is bad!
Also you: Look, here are all of the countries that have thrived off of capitalism! Isn't capitalism bad guys? Right? Right?

I'd call this a strawman but that would imply it had at least some superficial relationship to what I said.

[Suriyanakhon]

Anti-socialism is a weird concept because it's nothing more than a negation of an economic program with no positive counter program offered instead. Which shouldn't be much of a surprise considering all the right has been reduced to nowadays is just spiting anything that “the Left” advocates for with some of the flimsiest logical pretenses.