What do you think of Communism

[Land of The Furries]

Lmao ok even though this distinctly has no relation to the topic but I here ya on that. But I could go without the Netflix sub.

Make sure the factory for lava lamps is built first, I’ve requested more lava lamps than usual.

I need the computer first actually. Get the factory that makes 1660s built first.

Bro you do know that they make better computers than the 1660s right? Get an Asus or an Alienware or even something like from Newegg or something.

[Lower Nubia]

Make sure the factory for lava lamps is built first, I’ve requested more lava lamps than usual.

I need the computer first actually. Get the factory that makes 1660s built first.

Bro you do know that they make better computers than the 1660s right? Get an Asus or an Alienware or even something like from Newegg or something.

No, I want to play specific games but too fast a GPU causes issues for older games I like but I also want something that is capable of running current games if I want. Perhaps I won’t get that 1660s though, maybe a 3080?

Not that this is important, I have decided against the lava lamps, instead I want one of those hula hoops weights because of TikTok, can you build a factory for that?

[Land of The Furries]

Bro you do know that they make better computers than the 1660s right? Get an Asus or an Alienware or even something like from Newegg or something.

No, I want to play specific games but too fast a GPU causes issues for older games I like but I also want something that is capable of running current games if I want. Perhaps I won’t get that 1660s though, maybe a 3080?

Not that this is important, I have decided against the lava lamps, instead I want one of those hula hoops weights because of TikTok, can you build a factory for that?

I'm sure that if you look a little online you might find what you're looking for buddy.

[Lower Nubia]

No, I want to play specific games but too fast a GPU causes issues for older games I like but I also want something that is capable of running current games if I want. Perhaps I won’t get that 1660s though, maybe a 3080?

Not that this is important, I have decided against the lava lamps, instead I want one of those hula hoops weights because of TikTok, can you build a factory for that?

I'm sure that if you look a little online you might find what you're looking for buddy.

Absolutely.

In my simple requests I’ve desired 3 factories exist.

A factory for lava lamps.
A factory for 1660s Graphics cards.
A factory for Hula Hoops with weights due to TikTok.

The first factory has lost demand, the machines are running at half capacity the remaining machinery lie dormant and the staff has been set up in rota to work the factory in such a way that everybody works, even if for 4 hours compared to 8 they did at peak (meaning 4 hours a day of production is wasted). The second has lost demand, a similar story; Machinery going unused, and staff unable to be as productive as before.

The third factory is new to fit that niche but I suspect with time it won’t be needed either in the scale it once was and will become like the first 2 factories.

In a capitalist system the costs of this machinery and staff is regained through the price fluctuation of the commodity. The waste evident is recuperated financially for use elsewhere and the factories can be closed, yet profit has been generated in this system. The supply and demand of goods and services is controlled through exchange which even with factories now closing or slowing production the entirety of the operation from start up to slow down has generated value in the system. The companies which built these factories can now spend the money on a new /refitted factory set up for some other fad.

In a world where people are simply given those things, - where is the recuperation of the cost of invested resources (steel, electricity, gas, plastic, workers)? How do you then prioritise resources to provide the ability to fulfil each of the requests, given that resources themselves are fluctuating in their need and availability?

[Land of The Furries]

I'm sure that if you look a little online you might find what you're looking for buddy.

Absolutely.

In my simple requests I’ve desired 3 factories exist.

A factory for lava lamps.
A factory for 1660s Graphics cards.
A factory for Hula Hoops with weights due to TikTok.

The first factory has lost demand, the machines are running at half capacity the remaining machinery lie dormant and the staff has been set up in rota to work the factory in such a way that everybody works, even if for 4 hours compared to 8 they did at peak (meaning 4 hours a day of production is wasted). The second has lost demand, a similar story; Machinery going unused, and staff unable to be as productive as before.

The third factory is new to fit that niche but I suspect with time it won’t be needed either in the scale it once was and will become like the first 2 factories.

In a capitalist system the costs of this machinery and staff is regained through the price fluctuation of the commodity. The waste evident is recuperated financially for use elsewhere and the factories can be closed, yet profit has been generated in this system. The supply and demand of goods and services is controlled through exchange which even with factories now closing or slowing production the entirety of the operation from start up to slow down has generated value in the system. The companies which built these factories can now spend the money on a new /refitted factory set up for some other fad.

In a world where people are simply given those things, - where is the recuperation of the cost of invested resources (steel, electricity, gas, plastic, workers)? How do you then prioritise resources to provide the ability to fulfil each of the requests, given that resources themselves are fluctuating in their need and availability?

*facepalm*
Ok whatever floats your boat bro.

[Lower Nubia]

Absolutely.

In my simple requests I’ve desired 3 factories exist.

A factory for lava lamps.
A factory for 1660s Graphics cards.
A factory for Hula Hoops with weights due to TikTok.

The first factory has lost demand, the machines are running at half capacity the remaining machinery lie dormant and the staff has been set up in rota to work the factory in such a way that everybody works, even if for 4 hours compared to 8 they did at peak (meaning 4 hours a day of production is wasted). The second has lost demand, a similar story; Machinery going unused, and staff unable to be as productive as before.

The third factory is new to fit that niche but I suspect with time it won’t be needed either in the scale it once was and will become like the first 2 factories.

In a capitalist system the costs of this machinery and staff is regained through the price fluctuation of the commodity. The waste evident is recuperated financially for use elsewhere and the factories can be closed, yet profit has been generated in this system. The supply and demand of goods and services is controlled through exchange which even with factories now closing or slowing production the entirety of the operation from start up to slow down has generated value in the system. The companies which built these factories can now spend the money on a new /refitted factory set up for some other fad.

In a world where people are simply given those things, - where is the recuperation of the cost of invested resources (steel, electricity, gas, plastic, workers)? How do you then prioritise resources to provide the ability to fulfil each of the requests, given that resources themselves are fluctuating in their need and availability?

*facepalm*
Ok whatever floats your boat bro.

That it?

[Suriyanakhon]

How would I get a computer under Marxism to play Skyrim?

Under communism you would only play morrowind

Common Bolshevik W.

[Duvniask]

You don't even recognize who you're arguing with, lol.

But it is inferior. If I were a banana farmer and someone came to me with apples, prawns and labour vouchers in exchange for bananas, I'm gonna give my bananas to the guy with the apples. I can eat apples, I hate the taste of prawns and what am I gonna do with a useless labour voucher?

Stupid question. You're not supposed to do anything with them, anymore than a theater employee is going to "do something" with tickets. You presuppose it is useless because... why? You've just decided that on your own, for no reason.

The problem with all you're saying in this post is that you think exchange would still exist and have a purpose. You still think there's going to be people trading goods with one another. But there's zero purpose to doing exchange in an economy where production is directly social and planned to meet demand. Labor vouchers would exist as an accounting mechanism, not as a medium for the exchange of goods. They exist to ensure that bananas, or cars, or TVs, are fairly distributed, nothing more. To get the thing you want, you just give your credit/voucher and then society has logged that you have received your rightful share - it's not complicated.

This shows you understand nothing about what labor vouchers are for and that you don't understand anything about communist society, despite the supposed summaries you have read (don't make me laugh, it's the same thing anyone says).

Now you might suggest that "well the excess shoes and the excess apples would be donated back to the community, so you don't get to eat the excess apples". Well, there's two problems with that:

Why would excess apples be made in the first place? As a rounding error, perhaps, but what else would be the point? The people engaged in apple farming could happily work fewer hours or apply their skills elsewhere if the demand for apples fell, and no one would be worse off for it.

If you honestly think that people are gonna give their excess apples back to the community when they themselves can eat them, then you clearly know nothing about human nature

A farm hand does not care what happens to apples that are not his in the first place and he will not eat 5,000 pieces of a single type of fruit, which is of course also perishable. Yeah that makes a whole lot of sense...

3. What's going to stop people from circulating labour vouchers? If Bob pays me a labour voucher, what's gonna stop me from circulating it. Unless it says "this labour voucher belongs to Bob Jones, 23 March 2023". fine, but then what stops me from forging a labour voucher? And if you claim that whatever security we use to protect cash from forgery can be used on labour vouchers, that's stupid and wasteful. At least cash isn't single use

Right, you really need the oh-so-foreign concept of credit card technology and mobile-pay explained to you.

[Duvniask]

I'm sure that if you look a little online you might find what you're looking for buddy.

Absolutely.

In my simple requests I’ve desired 3 factories exist.

A factory for lava lamps.
A factory for 1660s Graphics cards.
A factory for Hula Hoops with weights due to TikTok.

The first factory has lost demand, the machines are running at half capacity the remaining machinery lie dormant and the staff has been set up in rota to work the factory in such a way that everybody works, even if for 4 hours compared to 8 they did at peak (meaning 4 hours a day of production is wasted). The second has lost demand, a similar story; Machinery going unused, and staff unable to be as productive as before.

The third factory is new to fit that niche but I suspect with time it won’t be needed either in the scale it once was and will become like the first 2 factories.

In a capitalist system the costs of this machinery and staff is regained through the price fluctuation of the commodity. The waste evident is recuperated financially for use elsewhere and the factories can be closed, yet profit has been generated in this system. The supply and demand of goods and services is controlled through exchange which even with factories now closing or slowing production the entirety of the operation from start up to slow down has generated value in the system. The companies which built these factories can now spend the money on a new /refitted factory set up for some other fad.

Am I alone in thinking this sounds like complete nonsense? If an enterprise has sunk costs and is unprofitable that means the money has already been squandered. Value has not been created; instead it has been destroyed. We'd never have crises if the harmonious, positive-feedback loop you presented here was a reality.

In a world where people are simply given those things, - where is the recuperation of the cost of invested resources (steel, electricity, gas, plastic, workers)? How do you then prioritise resources to provide the ability to fulfil each of the requests, given that resources themselves are fluctuating in their need and availability?

How does a lone Robinson Crusoe, washed up on an island, ever find out how to produce without being wasteful? Through conscious and thoughtful assessment of the means at hand and his ability to work them with his skill-set.

A communist society is no different, except that we'd be talking about directly social labor by a community instead of individual labor. Figuring out how much we need of good X and how much we can produce of it with current means Y is not as complicated as you're making it out to be. The apportioning of labor and of resources to be used up can be consciously undertaken without any mediation by exchange, just as it was the case in all societies before markets came to dominate them. People knew how to produce long before it was ever dictated to them by the need to supply an amorphous "market".

[Duvniask]

I don't see that it has to be, only that a society with the ability to meet most needs effortlessly would definitely expedite the creation of the social relations enabling free access/distribution based on need.


I'm unsure what you mean by a "statist" dictatorship of the proletariat. A dictatorship of the proletariat will have to seize state power, or state-like power to effect the changes required to end capitalism.

In any case, a bloated state will be filled with bureaucrats whose interests will often tend towards class compromise (regulation, reform, management, direction... of capital). When considering the specific case of Russia, the working class was already weak and further decimated by civil war. The level of industrialization was low and most of the population was composed of small-holders and peasants. Add to this the problem of isolation, and you have almost everything working against the survival of a working class dictatorship and everything working for a bureaucratic and bourgeois takeover. This is why the Bolsheviks always made a huge deal of out of the revolutions succeeding in Western Europe so they could come save their bacon. This did not happen, and the complete bureaucratization of the party (Stalin) was the end result. Stalinism represents the coming to power of the bureaucratic stratum; a counter-revolutionary reaction fostered by the pressures of international isolation and economic backwardness.

"Bureaucratic" was the word I was looking for, not statist. I apologize for my mistake.
In your opinion, is the overbloated bureaucracy of countries a la the Soviet Union a result of Leninist ideals such as the Vanguard party (and thus rooted in Leninism itself) or is it rather Stalin's re-interpretation of Leninism and the establishment of a more statist socialism with control focused at the top that resulted in the bureaucracy that you described?

Neither.

First of all, neither Marxism nor Leninism has or should have "ideals". It has theory, which is tested by logic and real world happenings.

Secondly, the idea of the vanguard is not exactly Lenin's, so much as it is something he "refined". A vanguard organization is inseparable from any sort of coherent communist movement. In its absence you'd just have a bunch of headless chickens. Even trade unions can only win local struggles and never properly challenge capitalism as a whole.

...

If one takes a critical view of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, then their party appears to have relied too much on being a conspiratorial and top-heavy clique that wound up separate from and ruling over the workers. Killing some of the foremost revolutionary workers and sailors at Kronstadt was not a good look, and it did not help that the Bolsheviks then tried to play the rebellion off as a petty bourgeois operation or foreign-directed plot.

But that would not be the full story, however. The reason the bureaucracy took over is not because Stalin reinterpreted something, but because of the economic and political situation of Russia after the revolution. Stalin's reinterpretation of Lenin is just a superficial legitimation of the change that the regime underwent. The early USSR was dominated by the need to industrialize and quickly - political debate centered around this topic. Under these circumstances, it's hard to imagine the bureaucracy would not have had a prominent role to play, because it's necessary for the state to take the reins and speed up industrial development and force agricultural centralization. The most heavily bureaucratic faction (Stalin's "Centre") won out, and the rest is history. Because capitalism had not even properly taken hold, and the bourgeois was weak, you'd instead have the state, overseen by a powerful bureaucracy, build the foundation of a bourgeois economy. And do not misunderstand: under this framework the bureaucracy rules, but the economy is thoroughly bourgeois at its core, and does not stop magically stop being so because Stalin declares it to be. Instead, the state is just a country-sized company, with a sprawling network of bureaucratic management.

[Australian rePublic]

But it is inferior. If I were a banana farmer and someone came to me with apples, prawns and labour vouchers in exchange for bananas, I'm gonna give my bananas to the guy with the apples. I can eat apples, I hate the taste of prawns and what am I gonna do with a useless labour voucher?

Stupid question. You're not supposed to do anything with them, anymore than a theater employee is going to "do something" with tickets. You presuppose it is useless because... why? You've just decided that on your own, for no reason.

The problem with all you're saying in this post is that you think exchange would still exist and have a purpose. You still think there's going to be people trading goods with one another. But there's zero purpose to doing exchange in an economy where production is directly social and planned to meet demand. Labor vouchers would exist as an accounting mechanism, not as a medium for the exchange of goods. They exist to ensure that bananas, or cars, or TVs, are fairly distributed, nothing more. To get the thing you want, you just give your credit/voucher and then society has logged that you have received your rightful share - it's not complicated.

This shows you understand nothing about what labor vouchers are for and that you don't understand anything about communist society, despite the supposed summaries you have read (don't make me laugh, it's the same thing anyone says).

Yea, and the system is still open to abuse. To think otherwise is ridiculous. And the minute it is abused is the minute where the system becomes somewhat capitalistic anyway. And if I am wrong , correct me.

Now you might suggest that "well the excess shoes and the excess apples would be donated back to the community, so you don't get to eat the excess apples". Well, there's two problems with that:

Why would excess apples be made in the first place? As a rounding error, perhaps, but what else would be the point? The people engaged in apple farming could happily work fewer hours or apply their skills elsewhere if the demand for apples fell, and no one would be worse off for it.

And how is that different to capitalism? When the demand for apples falls, apple hand workers either work fewer hours or work somewhere else. Now, when demand increases again, how the fuck will you get farm hands to work more hours for no reward? You can't just tell people "hey, look, yesturday you worked 5 hours, but today, you have to work 8 hours, and you'll get nothing in return for the extra hours." If you think anyone would do that, you're nuts. Especially for undesirable jobs, such as plumber, or garbage collector or something like that. In fact, how the fuck will you get anyone to be a plumber? Who would train to be a plumber in a communist society? Who would voluntarily fix toilets when you'd get the same level of reward for doing a less unpleasant job? In capitalist societies, people become plumbers because of the money. Who would do that in a communist society? Or fumigator? Or electrician? Or any other shitty job? Who the fuck would train to risk to do a job to risk their life in a hot, steamy roof, when for no training you can do an untrained job, such as supermarket shelf packer for the same reward? Or better yet, claim to be an actor or YouTuber and contribute nothing to society for the same reward? And what about all the people who became plumbers because of the money (which is a good proportion of them). They no longer have money, meaning they no longer have any incentive to fix sewers, what are you gonna do when all the plumbers resign or electricians resign because there's no benefit to doing any of those jobs? Force them to work? In that case, you're the oppressor, not the liberator. There's already a shortage of plumbers, electricians, etc. In some societies with better jobs for skilled workers, abd the only thing that attracts these workers to the industry is promise of reward. Who would do a complicated degree yo become a plumber and clean out sewers, or a complicated degree and risk their lives to be an electrician when there's no more money in it then doing an unskilled job. Sure, some people might persue a hobby, such as train driver (if they love trains) or truck driver (if they love driving), but this already happens under capitalism. Without monastery incentive, who's gonna do the jobs that no one wants to do? No body enjoys fixing toilets, no body enjoys going into sewer pipes or dealing with raw sewerage. People do it for the money. And these aren't unskilled jobs that anyone can do, these require specialised training. Who would be insane enough to learn how to fix sewer pipes in order to spend the rest of their lives doing it for no more reward than a nice air conditioned office job? Who would actually do that training? You'd have to be insane. And if you force people to do it, you're not the liberator, you're the oppressor. And the number of people who would do it altruisticly is significantly irrelevant

If you honestly think that people are gonna give their excess apples back to the community when they themselves can eat them, then you clearly know nothing about human nature

A farm hand does not care what happens to apples that are not his in the first place and he will not eat 5,000 pieces of a single type of fruit, which is of course also perishable. Yeah that makes a whole lot of sense...
[/Quote]
Not what I said. Please go back and actually read what I said.

Right, you really need the oh-so-foreign concept of credit card technology and mobile-pay explained to you.

And? Credit cards okay, because you're using the bank's momey, rather than your own, but debit cards and mobile pay? Come on, that's just a lazy argument. It's just invisible cash. If I pay $20 worth of cash vs paying $20 with my debit card (or over the mobile) it's exactly the same thing. I'm still $20 poorer and you're $20 richer. Debit cards and mobile payment work in the exact same manner as cash, but they're just invisible. For all intense and purposes, as far as this discussion is concerned, they may as well be identical. Really, what is the difference between physical cash and invisible cash? In terms of functionality, a debit card/mobile payment is (for our purposes) identical to cash, but invisible. There are differences such as processing times and processing fees, but they're irrelevant to this discussion. What matters is functionality, ad functionally, they're close enough to identical but one is invisible

Why don't you ask people who have actually lived under communism what they think (there's quite a few of them in this thread). Or do you just go after easy targets?

[Portzania]

if yuo no like capitalsm no iphone vuvuzela 8 billiond ead

[Australian rePublic]

Absolutely.

In my simple requests I’ve desired 3 factories exist.

A factory for lava lamps.
A factory for 1660s Graphics cards.
A factory for Hula Hoops with weights due to TikTok.

The first factory has lost demand, the machines are running at half capacity the remaining machinery lie dormant and the staff has been set up in rota to work the factory in such a way that everybody works, even if for 4 hours compared to 8 they did at peak (meaning 4 hours a day of production is wasted). The second has lost demand, a similar story; Machinery going unused, and staff unable to be as productive as before.

The third factory is new to fit that niche but I suspect with time it won’t be needed either in the scale it once was and will become like the first 2 factories.

In a capitalist system the costs of this machinery and staff is regained through the price fluctuation of the commodity. The waste evident is recuperated financially for use elsewhere and the factories can be closed, yet profit has been generated in this system. The supply and demand of goods and services is controlled through exchange which even with factories now closing or slowing production the entirety of the operation from start up to slow down has generated value in the system. The companies which built these factories can now spend the money on a new /refitted factory set up for some other fad.

Am I alone in thinking this sounds like complete nonsense? If an enterprise has sunk costs and is unprofitable that means the money has already been squandered. Value has not been created; instead it has been destroyed. We'd never have crises if the harmonious, positive-feedback loop you presented here was a reality.

In a world where people are simply given those things, - where is the recuperation of the cost of invested resources (steel, electricity, gas, plastic, workers)? How do you then prioritise resources to provide the ability to fulfil each of the requests, given that resources themselves are fluctuating in their need and availability?

How does a lone Robinson Crusoe, washed up on an island, ever find out how to produce without being wasteful? Through conscious and thoughtful assessment of the means at hand and his ability to work them with his skill-set.

A communist society is no different, except that we'd be talking about directly social labor by a community instead of individual labor. Figuring out how much we need of good X and how much we can produce of it with current means Y is not as complicated as you're making it out to be. The apportioning of labor and of resources to be used up can be consciously undertaken without any mediation by exchange, just as it was the case in all societies before markets came to dominate them. People knew how to produce long before it was ever dictated to them by the need to supply an amorphous "market".

But doesn't communism mena no government? Without a government, who will oversee all that? Who will oversee how much food needs to be produced? Who will say "okay, we've produced too much food, let's slow down production" or "okay, we've produced too little food, let's increase production" or "okay, these are your rations for the week", or "okay, we're increasing rations or okay, we're decreasing rations". Who oversees all that without a government? And for that matter, without a government, who prosecutes criminals? Who sets health and safety standards that food producers need to abide by? Who sets safety standards that train drivers must abide by? Without a government, who enforces laws preventing murder? Who oversees anything, really? Without a government, none of this works, really

[Washington Resistance Army]

Am I alone in thinking this sounds like complete nonsense? If an enterprise has sunk costs and is unprofitable that means the money has already been squandered. Value has not been created; instead it has been destroyed. We'd never have crises if the harmonious, positive-feedback loop you presented here was a reality.


How does a lone Robinson Crusoe, washed up on an island, ever find out how to produce without being wasteful? Through conscious and thoughtful assessment of the means at hand and his ability to work them with his skill-set.

A communist society is no different, except that we'd be talking about directly social labor by a community instead of individual labor. Figuring out how much we need of good X and how much we can produce of it with current means Y is not as complicated as you're making it out to be. The apportioning of labor and of resources to be used up can be consciously undertaken without any mediation by exchange, just as it was the case in all societies before markets came to dominate them. People knew how to produce long before it was ever dictated to them by the need to supply an amorphous "market".

But doesn't communism mena no government? Without a government, who will oversee all that? Who will oversee how much food needs to be produced? Who will say "okay, we've produced too much food, let's slow down production" or "okay, we've produced too little food, let's increase production" or "okay, these are your rations for the week", or "okay, we're increasing rations or okay, we're decreasing rations". Who oversees all that without a government? And for that matter, without a government, who prosecutes criminals? Who sets health and safety standards that food producers need to abide by? Who sets safety standards that train drivers must abide by? Without a government, who enforces laws preventing murder? Who oversees anything, really? Without a government, none of this works, really

Communism doesn't have a state, but that does not mean it lacks a government. While often used as synonyms they aren't entirely 1 to 1.

[Rakhalia]

But doesn't communism mena no government? Without a government, who will oversee all that? Who will oversee how much food needs to be produced? Who will say "okay, we've produced too much food, let's slow down production" or "okay, we've produced too little food, let's increase production" or "okay, these are your rations for the week", or "okay, we're increasing rations or okay, we're decreasing rations". Who oversees all that without a government? And for that matter, without a government, who prosecutes criminals? Who sets health and safety standards that food producers need to abide by? Who sets safety standards that train drivers must abide by? Without a government, who enforces laws preventing murder? Who oversees anything, really? Without a government, none of this works, really

Communism doesn't have a state, but that does not mean it lacks a government. While often used as synonyms they aren't entirely 1 to 1.

this ultimately boils down to how you define "government"

[Duvniask]

Or do you just go after easy targets?

Is this supposed to be some sort of self-own?

You're not an easy target, because it takes a lot of time and energy to deal with these absurd antics. It's not worth my, nor anyone else's time.

[Scots-Rhodesia]

Nazism is bad but Communism makes Nazism look like simple Liberalism and also Communists seem to be way more aggressive and rude than your average Nazi or Neo-Nazi.

[Bewaffnete Krafte]

Nazism is bad but Communism makes Nazism look like simple Liberalism and also Communists seem to be way more aggressive and rude than your average Nazi or Neo-Nazi.

Nazis gas and lynch people. That's way, way worse than your simple rude socialist.

[Lower Nubia]

Absolutely.

In my simple requests I’ve desired 3 factories exist.

A factory for lava lamps.
A factory for 1660s Graphics cards.
A factory for Hula Hoops with weights due to TikTok.

The first factory has lost demand, the machines are running at half capacity the remaining machinery lie dormant and the staff has been set up in rota to work the factory in such a way that everybody works, even if for 4 hours compared to 8 they did at peak (meaning 4 hours a day of production is wasted). The second has lost demand, a similar story; Machinery going unused, and staff unable to be as productive as before.

The third factory is new to fit that niche but I suspect with time it won’t be needed either in the scale it once was and will become like the first 2 factories.

In a capitalist system the costs of this machinery and staff is regained through the price fluctuation of the commodity. The waste evident is recuperated financially for use elsewhere and the factories can be closed, yet profit has been generated in this system. The supply and demand of goods and services is controlled through exchange which even with factories now closing or slowing production the entirety of the operation from start up to slow down has generated value in the system. The companies which built these factories can now spend the money on a new /refitted factory set up for some other fad.

Am I alone in thinking this sounds like complete nonsense? If an enterprise has sunk costs and is unprofitable that means the money has already been squandered. Value has not been created; instead it has been destroyed. We'd never have crises if the harmonious, positive-feedback loop you presented here was a reality.

It literally says profitable, can you not read? I’ve even highlighted it for you.

In a world where people are simply given those things, - where is the recuperation of the cost of invested resources (steel, electricity, gas, plastic, workers)? How do you then prioritise resources to provide the ability to fulfil each of the requests, given that resources themselves are fluctuating in their need and availability?

How does a lone Robinson Crusoe, washed up on an island, ever find out how to produce without being wasteful? Through conscious and thoughtful assessment of the means at hand and his ability to work them with his skill-set.

Drivel. Anyone can say they could try something it does not mean it works. Robin knows exactly what he needs he knows exactly everything in the system, his own thoughts and motives, and he provides his own needs he is the ultimate supplier and demander. Robin isn’t providing fuel to two divergent places from his hypothetical island refinery. He doesn’t know a concert is up in one place and it’ll need more fuel to accommodate the travellers, he doesn’t know that an incident at an oil rig means he’ll get half the supply to turn into fuel. Things he doesn’t know effects him. Using Robin on his own is precisely the misstep that cannot be scaled upwards in a society where everything is impersonal - by necessity. I cannot know who provides the fuel, the chocolate, the electricity, the lava lamps, the ball bearings on the machinery for the refinery for that fuel, the pesticides to keep the cocoa safe, the copper for the electrical transfer. Likewise they do not know my motives, is my usage superfluous? Which takes priority in a shortage? Is my need the easiest to fulfil?

A communist society is no different, except that we'd be talking about directly social labor by a community instead of individual labor. Figuring out how much we need of good X and how much we can produce of it with current means Y is not as complicated as you're making it out to be.

It is complicated, because the point is both abetting demand and supply and effectively prioritising resources.

If you have enough steel for one factory, which do you build first? The lava lamp factory or the 1660s factory? In our current world you build the one with the larger profitability first, or the one with the larger initial capital up front (capital given because investors tend to see profitability). The systems is available and it is quick and rapid.

The second, abetting supply and demand, is essential. We see how with the current gas crises that too little gas has been averted with higher prices so shortages have not occurred, how do you stop wanton gas usage when you produce too little? And no, you can’t just hand wave it away and say “we’ll produce more gas”, because we do that now- but it takes years to accomplish and yet you need to stop shortages rapidly (within months).

You need people to cut back on wasteful usage of gas; driving to the shop rather than walking for example.

How do you stop that?

The apportioning of labor and of resources to be used up can be consciously undertaken without any mediation by exchange, just as it was the case in all societies before markets came to dominate them. People knew how to produce long before it was ever dictated to them by the need to supply an amorphous "market".

Everything is consciously undertaken, that does not mean it’s efficient.

A system of value is necessary because you have to prioritise resources in a system. There is 80 fuel available to a port in Spain where lava lamps are distributed from a nearby factory. Both Alaska and California want 360 lava lamps, and If it costs 30 fuel to ship 90 lava lamps to Alaska or 20 fuel to ship 90 lava lamps to California, you will transport the lava lamps to California, because that is the order you can fulfill.

If the price of a Lava lamp in Alaska was higher and dissuaded so much consumption, to the point where only 270 lava lamps was wanted, you could fulfil either order.

How do you manipulate individual consumption for goods in a system where the need of those goods doesn’t match the output?

People knew how to produce long before it was ever dictated to them by the need to supply an amorphous "market".

In a very small scale at village and town level, where these concepts simply do not scale. I can’t chat to the fuel refinery in Saudi Arabia. I can chat to my local farmer. We’re talking a global economy, where rare earth metals are produced in China but needed in Europe. Or French cheese has demand in Japan, or where Taiawanese Semiconductors are wanted in Nicaragua.

In our world these things have a value added so that the cost to run cheese to Japan is profitable to whoever does it. The journey is not a waste and fuel is prioritised accordingly to that vessel being paid through by the higher cost.

A system of exchange is absolutely necessary, you can’t just say “we don’t need one because we will assess on what we need.” Assessment in a chain of supply needs communication, but importantly it needs indicators from which an assessment can be made. If I want a lava lamp, but there are too few, what indicators do I have that tell me how prevalent that item is?

[Des-Bal]

Nazis gas and lynch people. That's way, way worse than your simple rude socialist.

Are you arguing no socialist has ever done anything worse than be rude or that you can fairly compare benign behavior by one group to harmful behavior by another ? I mean it's also possible that was a useless statement to deflect the issue with.

[Bewaffnete Krafte]

Nazis gas and lynch people. That's way, way worse than your simple rude socialist.

Are you arguing no socialist has ever done anything worse than be rude or that you can fairly compare benign behavior by one group to harmful behavior by another ? I mean it's also possible that was a useless statement to deflect the issue with.

No, I mean that the vast majority of socialists today are just rude online while the vast majority of nazis today actively threaten and kill minorities and engage in racist and genocidal rhetoric.

[Des-Bal]

No, I mean that the vast majority of socialists today are just rude online while the vast majority of nazis today actively threaten and kill minorities and engage in racist and genocidal rhetoric.

Okay so it actually was the second thing because you've already downgraded from lynching and gassing to threatening and using genocidal rhetoric. So the vast majority of socialists are nebulously rude (but definitely not advocating armed revolution and murder) and the vast majority of nazis are actively threatening to kill people and engaging in racist genocidal rhetoric. Where are those stats coming from btw?

[Theodores Tomfooleries]

No, I mean that the vast majority of socialists today are just rude online while the vast majority of nazis today actively threaten and kill minorities and engage in racist and genocidal rhetoric.

Okay so it actually was the second thing because you've already downgraded from lynching and gassing to threatening and using genocidal rhetoric. So the vast majority of socialists are nebulously rude (but definitely not advocating armed revolution and murder) and the vast majority of nazis are actively threatening to kill people and engaging in racist genocidal rhetoric. Where are those stats coming from btw?

Why are we defending Nazis?

[Alternate Garza]

Are you arguing no socialist has ever done anything worse than be rude or that you can fairly compare benign behavior by one group to harmful behavior by another ? I mean it's also possible that was a useless statement to deflect the issue with.

No, I mean that the vast majority of socialists today are just rude online while the vast majority of nazis today actively threaten and kill minorities and engage in racist and genocidal rhetoric.

Well, I try to be a very polite socialist, but as I have some mental disorders, such as autism, I might come across as rude online.

[Des-Bal]

Why are we defending Nazis?

Why are we defaming them? Talking shit about nazis shouldn't necessitate exaggeration- they are basically the worst. When your philosophy doesn't suck its incredibly easy to contrast yourself from nazis.