Anti-Socialism Thread

[MineLegotia and Equestria]

A bit of socialism sprinkled into our lives is okay. But like sugar, there should not be too much of it.

[Alternamerica]

The Cato Institute, a Right-Libertarian biased source, is just as reliable as Jacobin magazine or a Trotskysit newspaper

California has all kinds of taxes and regulations that are causing small business owners and other residents to leave in droves. I'm inclined to believe the Cato Institute here even though I'm a right-authoritarian.

Taxes and Regulations =/= Social Democracy

Social Democracy is combining Positive and Negative Civil Liberties like glue that sticks community together. California focuses on Negative Civil Liberties but completely ignore Positive Liberties like Healthcare and Education. There are no social programs in California to help the community unless you're near starvation and even then, if you make a penny above a ridiculously low wage, you lose all support. Taxes are raised, but welfare spending is low, minimum wage is only increased to ensure there are enough poor people to depend on long hours and enough consumption for corporate profits. The state pockets all profits and subsidizes corporations to continue destroying the state's ecology to honor Plutus. That isn't Social Democracy, that's Neoliberalism on crack and even Blairites in the UK would be appalled at ex governor Jerry Brown's policies. But hey, at least wealthy gays can get married. Poor ones can die or something without healthcare

Here's some more info on what Social Democracy is: https://www.britannica.com/topic/social-democracy
AKA: Think of Central and Northern Europe

[Kowani]

The Cato Institute, a Right-Libertarian biased source, is just as reliable as Jacobin magazine or a Trotskysit newspaper

California has all kinds of taxes and regulations that are causing small business owners and other residents to leave in droves. I'm inclined to believe the Cato Institute here even though I'm a right-authoritarian.

Notice how my point was completely dodged.

[Disgraces]

Hold on, you say fascism needs to be destroyed but you're a third positionist?

You make it sound like these are contradictory viewpoints. They are not.

But the third position is neo fascist... do you mean third way?

[New haven america]

The Cato Institute, a Right-Libertarian biased source, is just as reliable as Jacobin magazine or a Trotskysit newspaper

California has all kinds of taxes and regulations that are causing small business owners and other residents to leave in droves. I'm inclined to believe the Cato Institute here even though I'm a right-authoritarian.

California's also having tons of people move there for jobs in big tech nd service companies.

[New haven america]

California has all kinds of taxes and regulations that are causing small business owners and other residents to leave in droves. I'm inclined to believe the Cato Institute here even though I'm a right-authoritarian.

Taxes and Regulations =/= Social Democracy

Social Democracy is combining Positive and Negative Civil Liberties like glue that sticks community together. California focuses on Negative Civil Liberties but completely ignore Positive Liberties like Healthcare and Education. There are no social programs in California to help the community unless you're near starvation and even then, if you make a penny above a ridiculously low wage, you lose all support. Taxes are raised, but welfare spending is low, minimum wage is only increased to ensure there are enough poor people to depend on long hours and enough consumption for corporate profits. The state pockets all profits and subsidizes corporations to continue destroying the state's ecology to honor Plutus. That isn't Social Democracy, that's Neoliberalism on crack and even Blairites in the UK would be appalled at ex governor Jerry Brown's policies. But hey, at least wealthy gays can get married. Poor ones can die or something without healthcare

Here's some more info on what Social Democracy is: https://www.britannica.com/topic/social-democracy
AKA: Think of Central and Northern Europe

For a lot of the US right wing that way to far left.

[The Reformed American Republic]

Taxes and Regulations =/= Social Democracy

Social Democracy is combining Positive and Negative Civil Liberties like glue that sticks community together. California focuses on Negative Civil Liberties but completely ignore Positive Liberties like Healthcare and Education. There are no social programs in California to help the community unless you're near starvation and even then, if you make a penny above a ridiculously low wage, you lose all support. Taxes are raised, but welfare spending is low, minimum wage is only increased to ensure there are enough poor people to depend on long hours and enough consumption for corporate profits. The state pockets all profits and subsidizes corporations to continue destroying the state's ecology to honor Plutus. That isn't Social Democracy, that's Neoliberalism on crack and even Blairites in the UK would be appalled at ex governor Jerry Brown's policies. But hey, at least wealthy gays can get married. Poor ones can die or something without healthcare

Here's some more info on what Social Democracy is: https://www.britannica.com/topic/social-democracy
AKA: Think of Central and Northern Europe

For a lot of the US right wing that way to far left.

Sad really. American social conservatism moved with a socdem economy would be good for the U.S..

[Nevertopia]

A bit of socialism sprinkled into our lives is okay. But like sugar, there should not be too much of it.

Ya, even I have to admit unchecked capitalism is destructive in the long-run. Still better than being a commie, though thats not a high bar to pass.

[The Greater Ohio Valley]

For a lot of the US right wing that way to far left.

Sad really. American social conservatism moved with a socdem economy would be good for the U.S..

Take out the social conservatism and sure.

[Vivolkha]

Ultimately technology will be more important than socialism or capitalism. With AI and additive manufacturing, things will get even cheaper, it is guaranteed. People will have to make choices about what kind of society we want.

This.

California is not neoliberal at all. According to the Cato Institute, it ranks #48 out of 50 states in terms of economic freedom. Neoliberalism requires immense economic freedom and California simply doesn't have this.

The same Cato Institute which ranks New Zealand and Denmark as having high economic freedom despite these places being well-oiled social democracies?

How are these contradictory?

[Resilient Acceleration]

Ultimately technology will be more important than socialism or capitalism. With AI and additive manufacturing, things will get even cheaper, it is guaranteed. People will have to make choices about what kind of society we want.

In fact, one of the problem we're having right now is that our available philosophical and moral system is hella inadequate for life in the next 30 years. We run the risk of being led by disastrous false prophets or misguided principles that looks good on paper but in collision with actual reality. There will simply be too much changes, and trying to fit everything into any pre-lightbulb philosophical system would be counterproductive.

[Kowani]

Ultimately technology will be more important than socialism or capitalism. With AI and additive manufacturing, things will get even cheaper, it is guaranteed. People will have to make choices about what kind of society we want.

This.

The same Cato Institute which ranks New Zealand and Denmark as having high economic freedom despite these places being well-oiled social democracies?

How are these contradictory?

Because the original claim was that social democracy is inherently anti-economic freedom.

[Honeydewistania]

Yell it louder for the people in the back!

He said: "I concur! And in a democratic capitalist country you can vote and regulate the market to fix those economic inequality, insecurity and instability! Democratic Social capitalism for the win!"

And that is why capitalism will succeed wherever it is tried.

How is success measured? Number of billionaires per capita?

[Glorious Hong Kong]

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.

In other words, Marx was a racist accelerationist like many of these identitarian crypto-Marxist rioters currently laying waste to American cities today. Sounds pretty millenarian and doomsday cultish to me. Interesting article by the way. Your source also indicts classical liberalism as the principal wellspring of racism and imperialism in the form of "civilizing missions". As a liberal, I'm not going to No True Scotsman my ideology out of trouble. I fully acknowledge that liberalism is to blame for racism and imperialism in the days of old and that Tocqueville and other liberal racists and imperialists were no less liberal than I am and I take full responsibility for it. I expect socialists and communists to do the same with Stalin and Mao. Only once they accept that the CCP and CCCP are no less communist than they are, can they even hope to address the root causes of the ongoing failure of their ideology of greed, envy, and cultural self-immolation.

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?

Sadly, many otherwise well-meaning liberals have allowed themselves to be knowingly or unknowingly indoctrinated or otherwise co-opted by various means into furthering the communist cause.

[Risottia]

1.I'd like to see a source supporting that capitalists believe that they're "voting with their money" and that that's the key point of capitalism.
2.The extracyclic crises of capitalist economies and the informational asymmetry between market players hint that capitalism does not imply a commercial success of the most efficient, effective and practical enterprise.
3.Capitalism has coexisted also with: slavery, imperialism, social democracy, fascism, absolute monarchy, oligarchy, and even with totalitarian countries led by a "communist" party.

Communism has coexisted with: Poverty, malnutrition, cannibalism, genocide, anti-semitism, civil war, cultural destruction, all within its own ideological borders.

Is that a "no U" argument?

[The Hindustani State]

I think some form of saffron socialism is good but we should avoid communism because that turns countries into Chinese puppet states like what happened to Nepal and Laos

[Resilient Acceleration]

I think some form of saffron socialism is good but we should avoid communism because that turns countries into Chinese puppet states like what happened to Nepal and Laos

I mean, China has long ditched Maoist socialism in favor of "Communism with Capitalist Characteristics". The problem with modern China is more of because it's governed by a genocidal, Orwellian, imperialist regime, and less of the result of actual socialism.

[Bindao]

I think some form of saffron socialism is good but we should avoid communism because that turns countries into Chinese puppet states like what happened to Nepal and Laos

I mean, China has long ditched Maoist socialism in favor of "Communism with Capitalist Characteristics". The problem with modern China is more of because it's governed by a genocidal, Orwellian, imperialist regime, and less of the result of actual socialism.

You are deeply mistaken if you think China has completely abandoned its revolutionary fervor of yesteryear.

[Resilient Acceleration]

I mean, China has long ditched Maoist socialism in favor of "Communism with Capitalist Characteristics". The problem with modern China is more of because it's governed by a genocidal, Orwellian, imperialist regime, and less of the result of actual socialism.

You are deeply mistaken if you think China has completely abandoned its revolutionary fervor of yesteryear.

Fervor hasn't, economic system has.

[Bindao]

You are deeply mistaken if you think China has completely abandoned its revolutionary fervor of yesteryear.

Fervor hasn't, economic system has.

I know this is anecdotal (but then, what would the world be without anecdotes?), nevertheless, over here, every couple of street corners there is a Chinese-owned pastry shop, and one of them has different notes and stamps glued on the wall, all with the face of Mao Zedong. It's a quite curious thing to see, specially in a Brazilian city.

[Glorious Hong Kong]

Not really. What you fail to understand is that Marx believed capitalism must come before the transition of power to a communist society. Marx does not view colonialism as beneficial, but it is progress. The oppressive system before colonization could never be restructured into one run by the people.

Marx: Colonialism is good, actually, because it fulfills my political objections.

We can thank liberal thinkers like Denis Diderot for actually opposing colonialism, not justifying it.

Thank god liberalism found its way out of the imperialist moral dilemma.

Yes because he wants it to prove communism can work. Don't you realize thats what hes talking about when colonialism is progress toward communism?

Marx also thinks capitalism is inevitable and it is necessary for the transition to communism. Marx=capitalist????

Hence, the justification for socialism with Chinese characteristics and the CCP's current political and economic trajectory.

comrade

I wonder how many people will lose their faith in capitalism due to this pandemic, as their eyes are opened to the horrors and inequalities they live in.

And communism is the answer how exactly?

Wait 'till GHK gets here.

I have a theory that that is not really sustainable long-term.


I have no clue-the astroturfing and media bubbles we live in make me somewhat unsure about the prospects of that.

I used to like GHK for his heavy anti-China stance but then he outed himself as a Trumper without realizing Xi is exactly what Trump wishes he was and is trying to be but is too stupid to become.

"Dictators for thee, not for me!" I guess.

Then you don't know what actual tyranny is.

America remains a robust, thriving, liberal democracy even after four years of "fascist, white supremacist tyrant" Donald Trump. It's almost as if he has never been and will never be a dictator-for-life. The American constitution and c. 250 years of democratic tradition will never allow that to happen. A number of high-ranking army officers have already published an open letter decrying his antics back in June when he cleared Lafayette Square so he could walk to a local church and hold up an upside-down Bible. I'd like to see him try to seize absolute power for himself and run for a third term. And he's standing up to an even worse tyrant in China as well as crypto-communist insurgents of a slightly different sort at home. He is all that stands between the free world and a second round of communism of both the Chinese and American subtypes. That is the real pandemic.

You should consider yourself lucky to have him as your president and to live in one of the freest societies in the world. The American flag remains a symbol of freedom and democracy to millions of people around the world from Hong Kong to Israel to India to England. Here's a group of Hong Kongers singing the U.S. national anthem and waving the American flag. Also note that Donald Trump is extremely popular in India and Israel, and I'm a staunch supporter of both countries and their geopolitical interests align neatly with mine and with those of the United States.

The communist-inspired Kenosha BLM riots were the very last straw for me and they are reminiscent of the 1967 CCP-backed leftist riots that aimed to destabilize and seize control of Hong Kong, then a British colony. They had succeeded in Macau just a year earlier, enabling Beijing to administer the territory in all but name. Communism, not Donald Trump, not wHiTe sUpReMaCy, not some other random boogeyman these communists can conjure up, is the real threat to liberal democracy in America, Hong Kong, and the rest of the world. Only radical Islamism has been able to eclipse it in some parts of the world. I'm done sitting on the fence. Communism is the reason I decided to make that mental leap and become a Trump supporter.

Donald Trump is the lesser evil compared to the absolute woke insanity these leftists intend to unleash on America and the rest of the world with Joe Biden as their "moderate" puppet. The radical Marxist insurgency intends to implement a system of top-down preferential treatment, affirmative action and special rights for blacks, Hispanics, Arabs, Muslims, and women with a view to addressing "historical grievances" and disparities irrespective of individual differences, merit, and qualifications, while whites, men, Jews, (East) Asians, Christians, and atheists get kicked to the curb and told to "check their privilege" and apologize to blacks, women, and Muslims for the "crime" of existing.

This is eerily reminiscent to the overtly racist system of institutional discrimination and affirmative action that favors Malays and Muslims at the expense of Chinese, Indians, and East Malaysian natives that the right-wing, Malaysian government has practiced for decades to the detriment of economic progress and real, racial justice and equality. Malaysian fascists and woke, identitarian, American Marxists are functionally identical in the kinds of things they advocate and I see no difference between the two groups. The horseshoe theory is clearly evident in what these apparently disparate ideologies have in common.

The identitarian, intersectional version of communism being promoted and normalized in America is cultural Marxism of the Frankfurt variety. The CCP practices a slightly different brand of communism, obviously. But both groups of communists and crypto-Marxists are currently waging war on democracy itself in their own, distinct way, even if they may not like each other very much.

Does socialism still present a threat to the world? To your country? Not remotely. Not sure what sort of bogeyman the OP is thinking of, but there isn't some small group of socialist elites influencing every facet of society and bending it to their will for personal power and gain while ignoring the impending climate crisis.

There is. It's called the Chinese Communist Party.

There is, however, a small group of capitalist elites influencing every facet of society and bending it to their will for personal power and gain while ignoring the impending climate crisis.

And this group is increasingly pandering, in the West, at least, to an increasingly powerful woke, crypto-Marxist lobby in what appears to be an early sign of crony capitalism and political favoritism as it is currently being practiced in China and Hong Kong right now. Neoliberal elitists will continue to bend over and appease the Reds until their backs break and they will be doomed to be servants and cheerleaders to their communist masters unless they wake the fuck up and stop selling their souls. Joe Biden is the centrist, neoliberal elite's last hurrah and their very last attempt to resist the coming red tide. They have nothing left to fall back on and no real solutions. All that's left is Trump.

To answer the OP's question about communism in my country, our government has always been officially anti-communist at least during the Cold War. The racist, right-wing government managed to do a good job of flushing out communist insurgents on the peninsula and in my home state, so at least that's one good point on their mostly abysmal report card. However, we have since normalized relations with China and many of my fellow Malaysian Chinese, including relatives of mine, continue to worship the CCP simply because of a shared ethnic and cultural heritage. I'm thoroughly ashamed of them and if they love China so much, why don't they move there instead of betraying Malaysia and kicking HK protesters while they're down?

While Islamism poses a bigger and more immediate threat to Malaysian democracy than communism, communism continues to pose a constant, low-level threat to Malaysians in the form of a pro-CCP fifth column eager to serve Beijing and already, two Malaysians have been arrested for hacking into U.S. networks on China's behalf. Their extradition to the USA is a more than welcome development.

[La Xinga]

A bit of socialism sprinkled into our lives is okay. But like sugar, there should not be too much of it.

Agree, but a little less than sugar.

[Bindao]

Then you don't know what actual tyranny is.

America remains a robust, thriving, liberal democracy even after four years of "fascist, white supremacist tyrant" Donald Trump. It's almost as if he has never been and will never be a dictator-for-life. The American constitution and c. 250 years of democratic tradition will never allow that to happen. A number of high-ranking army officers have already published an open letter decrying his antics back in June when he cleared Lafayette Square so he could walk to a local church and hold up an upside-down Bible. I'd like to see him try to seize absolute power for himself and run for a third term. And he's standing up to an even worse tyrant in China as well as crypto-communist insurgents of a slightly different sort at home. He is all that stands between the free world and a second round of communism of both the Chinese and American subtypes. That is the real pandemic.

You should consider yourself lucky to have him as your president and to live in one of the freest societies in the world. The American flag remains a symbol of freedom and democracy to millions of people around the world from Hong Kong to Israel to India to England. Here's a group of Hong Kongers singing the U.S. national anthem and waving the American flag. Also note that Donald Trump is extremely popular in India and Israel, and I'm a staunch supporter of both countries and their geopolitical interests align neatly with mine and with those of the United States.

Too bad this is all going to end in a relatively short span of time, as far as historical time is concerned. The American empire is, like its predecessors, destined to fall, and in its wake a new Asian empire will most likely emerge. Indeed, a future led by the East, in general, and by China, in particular, is considerably plausible, and a geopolitical affront to the winners of the Cold War is not a mere hypothesis of imminent verification, but an ineluctable fact.

[Glorious Hong Kong]

But yeah, if the Soviet Union is a badly designed and rotting building with no roof, then Russia is the building after it collapsed into rubble.

*Into rouble.

1.I'd like to see a source supporting that capitalists believe that they're "voting with their money" and that that's the key point of capitalism.
2.The extracyclic crises of capitalist economies and the informational asymmetry between market players hint that capitalism does not imply a commercial success of the most efficient, effective and practical enterprise.
3.Capitalism has coexisted also with: slavery, imperialism, social democracy, fascism, absolute monarchy, oligarchy, and even with totalitarian countries led by a "communist" party.

Communism has coexisted with: Poverty, malnutrition, cannibalism, genocide, anti-semitism, civil war, cultural destruction, all within its own ideological borders.

From my dispatch:

Communism, also known as Marxism, is a failed and widely discredited ideology whose legacy is poverty, mass starvation, cultural suicide and genocide, ethnic cleansing, rape, infanticide, torture, mass murder, the dismantling of longstanding cultural and political institutions, state capitalism, greed, corruption, megalomania, ultranationalism, racism, homophobia, imperialism, neocolonialism, broken promises, outright lies, shameless propaganda, face-saving coverups, deadly viral pandemics, entitled, elitist, conservative, upper-class snobbery and the accompanying oppression and subjugation of the working poor, and fascism.

I should add antisemitism to the list. There's a very good reason the "progressive" Left today suffers from it.

It's important to remember that socialism is not universal healthcare, public roads, free public education, taxes, unions, or "the government doing stuff." These are social policies, not socialist policies, and they are all perfectly compatible with capitalism.

Thank God you posted this clarification. I am pretty anti-communist and I'm not a fan of socialism, but I roll my eyes when some people claim that single payer healthcare is communist or that government doing anything to help non-rich people is evil communism sneaking in.

All of these social perks are also compatible with liberalism, specifically social liberalism (in the economic sense). I support all of these things. Communism isn't all about economics, as the rise of cultural, identitarian, intersectional Marxism and the recent BLM riots have shown.

Quite a few popular socialist governments were tried but taken out by fascism. *snip* the Prague Spring failed. Very few socialist governments who announce themselves to the world last.

The Prague Spring was an anti-socialist, anti-communist, anti-Soviet, pro-democracy uprising that was literally crushed by the Red Army.

[Senkaku]

*snip*

Do you ever have conversations with socialists about what they believe, or listen to what they have to say? It seems to me you spend most of your time on this forum putting words into people's mouths in the most long-winded and hyperbolic fashion possible, relying on the density and length of your text and the extremist language used to turn people off from even engaging with it unless they agree with it because it would be too much trouble. It's tiresome to read, tiresome to engage with, and worst of all, it's a waste of your time, because it doesn't lead to conversations where you can learn anything new about the world. It's just a pseudo-monastic recitation of political language and specific right-wing terminology and iconography that serves more as symbolism than anything else. You squeeze in as many negative descriptors as possible to the point that it's almost comical.

I mean, why do you think human beings end up believing in socialism? Do you really think people are so easily hoodwinked by what you seem to describe as some kind of ideology of pure evil that has such a ludicrously black-and-white moral distinction from capitalism or whatever you believe in? Do you think that so many people would be unable to distinguish between good and evil, if they are as clearly defined as you claim? Do you consider what might motivate other humans to believe in the things they profess to believe in, or that their sincere expressions of their thoughts might actually be just that, rather than Trojan horses for some monstrous Orwellian evil?