Is True Communism Possible?

[Crysuko]

I never claimed my situation was as bad as theirs. That's a strawman. Wage slavery is still slavery; that it's not as bad as chattel slavery is a non-sequitur.

No it's not slavery, it's not a non sequitur you referred to slavery specifically because it carries the heavy connotation of ownership of another human. If you said "death is better than wage slavery" everyone would have laughed at you because the thing you're mad about isn't as bad as the emotionally charged term you're pegging it to. Mad respect for the strategy though, I'm going to call taxes "income rape".

you're a libertarian now?

[Torrocca]

I never claimed my situation was as bad as theirs. That's a strawman. Wage slavery is still slavery; that it's not as bad as chattel slavery is a non-sequitur.

No it's not slavery, it's not a non sequitur you referred to slavery specifically because it carries the heavy connotation of ownership of another human. If you said "death is better than wage slavery" everyone would have laughed at you because the thing you're mad about isn't as bad as the emotionally charged term you're pegging it to. Mad respect for the strategy though, I'm going to call taxes "income rape".

You do know there were people who lived under bondage of the system of chattel slavery that recognized wage slavery as, well, wage slavery?

Most famously, Frederick Douglass had this to say: "experience demonstrates that there may be a slavery of wages only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other."

Or should we chalk up his lived experience, among others, to be something less accurate than your claim?

[Des-Bal]

you're a libertarian now?

Now and always.

You do know there were people who lived under bondage of the system of chattel slavery that recognized wage slavery as, well, wage slavery?

Most famously, Frederick Douglass had this to say: "experience demonstrates that there may be a slavery of wages only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other."

Or should we chalk up his lived experience, among others, to be something less accurate than your claim?

Invite him to the thread I'll tell him he's wrong too.

[Torrocca]

you're a libertarian now?

Now and always.

You do know there were people who lived under bondage of the system of chattel slavery that recognized wage slavery as, well, wage slavery?

Most famously, Frederick Douglass had this to say: "experience demonstrates that there may be a slavery of wages only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other."

Or should we chalk up his lived experience, among others, to be something less accurate than your claim?

Invite him to the thread I'll tell him he's wrong too.

Oh, sweet, we are nullifying his lived experiences with these systems. Cool.

[Ifreann]

Yeah you could get them for pennies in FRG.
In the grorious

Glorious?

"German" "Demokratik" "Respublik" you had to wait for at least 18 years should you dare to say "i dont want it in white"

Deutsche Demokratische Republik.

[Crysuko]

Now and always.

Invite him to the thread I'll tell him he's wrong too.

Oh, sweet, we are nullifying his lived experiences with these systems. Cool.

I feel a perverse sense of satisfaction

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

Yeah you could get them for pennies in FRG.
In the grorious

Glorious?

"German" "Demokratik" "Respublik" you had to wait for at least 18 years should you dare to say "i dont want it in white"

Deutsche Demokratische Republik.

Yeah and?
We are talking about an existence more in common with a Soviet colony worshipping Soviet Neonazism than "German", "Democratic" or a "Republic".

[Reverend Norv]

Now and always.

Invite him to the thread I'll tell him he's wrong too.

Oh, sweet, we are nullifying his lived experiences with these systems. Cool.

On the contrary, I am quite prepared to accept Douglass's opinion of chattel slavery as authoritative, since he actually experienced it. I am not prepared to accept his view of "wage slavery" as authoritative, because he never experienced that. And in any case, it is flatly disingenuous to compare 19th-century industrial working conditions - in an era before OSHA, the minimum wage, and the modern welfare state - to the status of even the worst-off of modern American workers. Working the register at McDonald's is not comparable to being a child laborer in a 19th-century smeltery, much less to being a slave laborer for the Burmese Army today.

[Torrocca]

Oh, sweet, we are nullifying his lived experiences with these systems. Cool.

On the contrary, I am quite prepared to accept Douglass's opinion of chattel slavery as authoritative, since he actually experienced it. I am not prepared to accept his view of "wage slavery" as authoritative, because he never experienced that. And in any case, it is flatly disingenuous to compare 19th-century industrial working conditions - in an era before OSHA, the minimum wage, and the modern welfare state - to the status of even the worst-off of modern American workers. Working the register at McDonald's is not comparable to being a child laborer in a 19th-century smeltery, much less to being a slave laborer for the Burmese Army today.

If he didn't experience both, why would he even bother commenting on the latter with a mention of experience with it?

A modern worker in America may have it significantly better today in many regards, in any case, but that doesn't mean they're not working under a shitty system, even if working class individuals have it worse elsewhere in the world. There's a reason far too many have to work multiple jobs just to sustain their so-called privilege of sometimes-adequate shelter, among other things.

[Nilokeras]

Glorious?

Deutsche Demokratische Republik.

Yeah and?
We are talking about an existence more in common with a Soviet colony worshipping Soviet Neonazism than "German", "Democratic" or a "Republic".

There's that strange, desperate need to equivocate Nazism and communism again - nevermind the fact that the GDR and the Soviets were significantly more zealous in their denazification efforts than than the West, here we have someone who is so unfamiliar with the things the Soviets and East Germans did that they have to resort to invented Nazism to get something to throw.

[Reverend Norv]

On the contrary, I am quite prepared to accept Douglass's opinion of chattel slavery as authoritative, since he actually experienced it. I am not prepared to accept his view of "wage slavery" as authoritative, because he never experienced that. And in any case, it is flatly disingenuous to compare 19th-century industrial working conditions - in an era before OSHA, the minimum wage, and the modern welfare state - to the status of even the worst-off of modern American workers. Working the register at McDonald's is not comparable to being a child laborer in a 19th-century smeltery, much less to being a slave laborer for the Burmese Army today.

If he didn't experience both, why would he even bother commenting on the latter with a mention of experience with it?

A modern worker in America may have it significantly better today in many regards, in any case, but that doesn't mean they're not working under a shitty system, even if working class individuals have it worse elsewhere in the world. There's a reason far too many have to work multiple jobs just to sustain their so-called privilege of sometimes-adequate shelter, among other things.

I don't disagree at all. But "a shitty system" is not the same thing as slavery. Again: I know those folks who were conscripted as porters by the Tatmadaw. The injustices facing working-class Americans are real and profound, but they are simply not comparable to what my friends suffered. It does your cause no good to conflate these experiences by calling them both "slavery"; on the contrary, it leads anyone who has actually seen slave labor firsthand to conclude that you don't know what you are talking about. Hyperbole renders your argument weaker, not stronger.

[Ifreann]

Glorious?

Deutsche Demokratische Republik.

Yeah and?
We are talking about an existence more in common with a Soviet colony worshipping Soviet Neonazism than "German", "Democratic" or a "Republic".

I'm just correcting your spelling. Your attempts to imply fascism by use of German might be a little less transparent if you would take the time to use the correct German.

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

Yeah and?
We are talking about an existence more in common with a Soviet colony worshipping Soviet Neonazism than "German", "Democratic" or a "Republic".

I'm just correcting your spelling. Your attempts to imply fascism by use of German might be a little less transparent if you would take the time to use the correct German.

Do I look like I care?

[Ifreann]

I'm just correcting your spelling. Your attempts to imply fascism by use of German might be a little less transparent if you would take the time to use the correct German.

Do I look like I care?

I wouldn't know.

[Torrocca]

If he didn't experience both, why would he even bother commenting on the latter with a mention of experience with it?

A modern worker in America may have it significantly better today in many regards, in any case, but that doesn't mean they're not working under a shitty system, even if working class individuals have it worse elsewhere in the world. There's a reason far too many have to work multiple jobs just to sustain their so-called privilege of sometimes-adequate shelter, among other things.

I don't disagree at all. But "a shitty system" is not the same thing as slavery. Again: I know those folks who were conscripted as porters by the Tatmadaw. The injustices facing working-class Americans are real and profound, but they are simply not comparable to what my friends suffered. It does your cause no good to conflate these experiences by calling them both "slavery"; on the contrary, it leads anyone who has actually seen slave labor firsthand to conclude that you don't know what you are talking about. Hyperbole renders your argument weaker, not stronger.

I mean, I don't necessarily disagree there, but I don't necessarily fully agree, either. I can agree that calling it such is more likely hurtful to the cause itself and something that becomes an easy talking point for reactionaries, and that its use does to a degree overly-conflate it to actual, bonafide slavery, but I don't exactly see it as a wholly inaccurate descriptor when people with lived experiences under both can call both such, if only because them having those experiences gives them a unique perspective in this matter that can't be wholly ignored.

That said, it does benefit to refer to wage slavery as something else to avoid those negatives.

In any case, the recognition of these systems as terrible in their own regards is more important than terminology, which we've got full agreement on, which matters more to me in any case.

[Torrocca]

Do I look like I care?

I wouldn't know.

Wait, you don't have a camera in their room like the rest of us?

Weird.

[Sordhau]

If he didn't experience both, why would he even bother commenting on the latter with a mention of experience with it?

A modern worker in America may have it significantly better today in many regards, in any case, but that doesn't mean they're not working under a shitty system, even if working class individuals have it worse elsewhere in the world. There's a reason far too many have to work multiple jobs just to sustain their so-called privilege of sometimes-adequate shelter, among other things.

I don't disagree at all. But "a shitty system" is not the same thing as slavery. Again: I know those folks who were conscripted as porters by the Tatmadaw. The injustices facing working-class Americans are real and profound, but they are simply not comparable to what my friends suffered. It does your cause no good to conflate these experiences by calling them both "slavery"; on the contrary, it leads anyone who has actually seen slave labor firsthand to conclude that you don't know what you are talking about. Hyperbole renders your argument weaker, not stronger.

It is entirely appropriate to refer to wage slavery as a form of genuine slavery, because that is fundamentally what it is. That it is less uglier than chattel slavery is irrelevant; what privileges workers have today were not granted out of benevolence or empathy, they had to be fought for often at great risk of repression or even death. The explicit definition of slavery is the treatment of people as property and that is fundamentally how a Capitalist system views workers: as resources, not people. Workers are by and large beholden to their employers and their rules with little avenue to improve their situations. It doesn't matter that they can quit their jobs when being unemployed is a death sentence in and of itself and that every place of employment is largely the same in that workers have no representation, their concerns are ignored, and they are callously exploited for the gain of faceless shareholders whom they've never even met. That society has managed to delude itself into believing this is a desirable or sustainable status quo is perhaps the greatest psyop of the millennia. Just as slaves have to fight for their liberation workers have to fight for theirs. It's an uncomfortable reality that people don't want to face because they don't want to accept that they're living in a deplorable system that leaves everyday people to die because it costs money to take care of them, and with our corporate-dominated media and government it's been all to easy to obfuscate the realities of working conditions in a Capitalist system.

The value of my labor should not be up to some suit whose never worked an honest day in his life. That he gets to decide this against my will is little different from the master who decides his slaves can and should be working harder than they are. Neither care if their workers are suffering or die. Their goal and aim is profit for themselves and our expense. That one faces worse conditions simply isn't relevant at all and is totally dismissive of the other's struggle. Which ties back to my initial response: "Others have it worse so stop complaining." This is exactly what you are saying; you dismissing my own experiences over the terminology I'm using because someone you know had it worse, and that's horseshit.

[Reverend Norv]

I don't disagree at all. But "a shitty system" is not the same thing as slavery. Again: I know those folks who were conscripted as porters by the Tatmadaw. The injustices facing working-class Americans are real and profound, but they are simply not comparable to what my friends suffered. It does your cause no good to conflate these experiences by calling them both "slavery"; on the contrary, it leads anyone who has actually seen slave labor firsthand to conclude that you don't know what you are talking about. Hyperbole renders your argument weaker, not stronger.

It is entirely appropriate to refer to wage slavery as a form of genuine slavery, because that is fundamentally what it is. That it is less uglier than chattel slavery is irrelevant; what privileges workers have today were not granted out of benevolence or empathy, they had to be fought for often at great risk of repression or even death. The explicit definition of slavery is the treatment of people as property and that is fundamentally how a Capitalist system views workers: as resources, not people. Workers are by and large beholden to their employers and their rules with little avenue to improve their situations. It doesn't matter that they can quit their jobs when being unemployed is a death sentence in and of itself and that every place of employment is largely the same in that workers have no representation, their concerns are ignored, and they are callously exploited for the gain of faceless shareholders whom they've never even met. That society has managed to delude itself into believing this is a desirable or sustainable status quo is perhaps the greatest psyop of the millennia. Just as slaves have to fight for their liberation workers have to fight for theirs. It's an uncomfortable reality that people don't want to face because they don't want to accept that they're living in a deplorable system that leaves everyday people to die because it costs money to take care of them, and with our corporate-dominated media and government it's been all to easy to obfuscate the realities of working conditions in a Capitalist system.

The value of my labor should not be up to some suit whose never worked an honest day in his life. That he gets to decide this against my will is little different from the master who decides his slaves can and should be working harder than they are. Neither care if their workers are suffering or die. Their goal and aim is profit for themselves and our expense. That one faces worse conditions simply isn't relevant at all and is totally dismissive of the other's struggle. Which ties back to my initial response: "Others have it worse so stop complaining." This is exactly what you are saying; you dismissing my own experiences over the terminology I'm using because someone you know had it worse, and that's horseshit.

Yeah, that's what I'm doing. When all is said and done, nobody has ever beaten you with a bamboo cane to make you work harder, and nobody has ever held a mock execution of you for his own amusement, and nobody has ever threatened to kill your family if you run away. No matter how demeaned you feel, no matter how much you wish you could quit, those differences are fundamental. Your experience does not fit the terminology you use, because what you are experiencing is not slavery - and if you had ever seen the real thing up close, you would know that.

I am not angry with you; your willingness to conflate these things is based on ignorance, not malice. But it's important to understand the limits of your own experience. I have seen how much worse it can get, and you have not, and I am telling you that the difference is not a matter of degree. It's fundamental. You can believe me or not; you can insist that your ignorance should count for more than the evidence of my own eyes. But it's the truth.

[Theodores Tomfooleries]

Do yall guys like dippin dots

[Elwher]

No it's not slavery, it's not a non sequitur you referred to slavery specifically because it carries the heavy connotation of ownership of another human. If you said "death is better than wage slavery" everyone would have laughed at you because the thing you're mad about isn't as bad as the emotionally charged term you're pegging it to. Mad respect for the strategy though, I'm going to call taxes "income rape".

You do know there were people who lived under bondage of the system of chattel slavery that recognized wage slavery as, well, wage slavery?

Most famously, Frederick Douglass had this to say: "experience demonstrates that there may be a slavery of wages only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other."

Or should we chalk up his lived experience, among others, to be something less accurate than your claim?

And going back to the original comment, do you think he would rather have died in 1830 or lived as a slave until he escaped in 1838? I doubt it, so slavery is not necessarily worse than death.

[Theodores Tomfooleries]

Maybe the real question we should be asking is if True Capitalism is possible.

[Torrocca]

You do know there were people who lived under bondage of the system of chattel slavery that recognized wage slavery as, well, wage slavery?

Most famously, Frederick Douglass had this to say: "experience demonstrates that there may be a slavery of wages only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other."

Or should we chalk up his lived experience, among others, to be something less accurate than your claim?

And going back to the original comment, do you think he would rather have died in 1830 or lived as a slave until he escaped in 1838? I doubt it, so slavery is not necessarily worse than death.

I don't know and I don't care to try and take a guess at something that intimately personal of an individual's feelings toward such a horror.

Doing so to argue which is better is crude.

[Salus Maior]

No. But do complain in a way that doesn't pretend your situation is as bad as theirs. You are not choosing between death and slavery. Complain in a way that doesn't pretend that you are.

I never claimed my situation was as bad as theirs. That's a strawman. Wage slavery is still slavery; that it's not as bad as chattel slavery is a non-sequitur.

Wage slavery is something very specific and I doubt you're suffering that.

[Pan-Pacific Unity]

I'm not sure why people are attempting to discuss the relative merits of capitalism and communism by examining the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China. Surely if a comparison is to be made, it would be done between actual communist socioeconomic principles and those capitalism, not between two different forms of capitalism which have nothing to do with communism. This is like comparing apples and oranges while really only comparing two different varieties of apple.

[Iskanistan]

I'm not sure why people are attempting to discuss the relative merits of capitalism and communism by examining the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China. Surely if a comparison is to be made, it would be done between actual communist socioeconomic principles and those capitalism, not between two different forms of capitalism which have nothing to do with communism. This is like comparing apples and oranges while really only comparing two different varieties of apple.

Theres some Marxist-Leninists aroudn who believe the USSR was the best thing ever. Even a few think the same about China.