Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Askot Bokbondeler]

Ah, okay, even more clear now.  It's clear that any discussion of Communism is inherently mired in differing interpretations and assumptions about the same words.  I think the one at work for most people, certainly in this thread anyway, on the other side of Communism inherently assume that Authoritarian Communism is implied, because an authoritarian state is the one kind that would have a hope of actually making universal material equality and altruism function, and therefore argue against that model.  The idea that sans-authority hippie communes are doomed to failure from the start barely makes mention, because nobody entertains the idea long enough to want to disprove it.

what about communist parties in democratic countries? we got those, here in europe, they aren't authoritarian, but they usually are communist. besides, most internet commies are of the hippie kind

[Aqizzar]

Allegedly anarch-communist communes worked fairly well in Catalonia. I dont know to what extent it's true...

Not well at all, because it was really nothing of the kind.  Catalonia was "Communist" the way most European countries then and now are trending, with strong social services, but plenty of private property rights.  They were only "anarchic" in that they were a city-state separated from any nation.  They still had an internal city government, with a strong police force, and social order kept by worker unions and so forth.  Also, it's a lot easier to get people to work together for the community good and share their property when you're a city-state threatened on all sides by a civil war, and there's not much property to share anyway.

what about communist parties in democratic countries? we got those, here in europe, they aren't authoritarian, but they usually are communist. besides, most internet commies are of the hippie kind

Yeah, those are the "social welfare" type Communists, who aren't really going for the abolition of private property and material incentive, they just want more government welfare services.  And "internet commies" are indeed of the hippie kind, because they're all sheltered suburbanite teenagers who have no idea what a hard day's work means or any real concept of economics.

[Askot Bokbondeler]

Yeah, those are the "social welfare" type Communists, who aren't really going for the abolition of private property and material incentive, they just want more government welfare services.  And "internet commies" are indeed of the hippie kind, because they're all sheltered suburbanite teenagers who have no idea what a hard day's work means or any real concept of economics.

i see nothin i disagree with.
recapitulating, people that go by the name "communist" can be clueless teenagers or people that value social welfare more than they value economic liberties, some of them being more authoritarian than others. so criticizing communism for being too authoritarian or too liberal is a moot point unless your talking about a specific situation.

[Grakelin]

The idea that all Western Socialists are suburban teenagers is silly, especially considering that suburban teenagers will attach themselves to and profess the genius of anybody from Nietzche to Plato to Aristotle to Smith to Marx to Rand, without ever stopping to think about what they've just read about, how it actually relates to their life, or why they're drawn to this particular political or philosophical theorist (*cough*armok*cough*).

I've met a number of people in the Sociology field, and most of them have Socialist ideals (except for a few sociopaths). Maybe it's just a cultural thing for Canadians, but I've never met anybody who has actively promoted a right wing ideology who wasn't a complete idiot and unable to actually support their crazy notions in a reasoned debate. This will probably change (haha, no it won't, there will just be more of them) when Sun News (Which the incumbent media is calling "The Fox News of the North") comes out in January. More likely, it will just be even worse for life in Atlantic Canada when thousands of military personnel (both the NCOs from poor Newfoundland backgrounds, and the blue-blooded and wealthy officers), misinformed unemployed, and oppressed minimum-wage workers who have actually been convinced that unions are sinful suddenly get some back up when they say things like "The problem with Fredericton is all the Asians".

[Aqizzar]

I assume you're responding to me?  Because I wasn't lumping Communist parties in Western countries in with "internet communists" like Askot mentioned, i.e. money-is-the-root-of-racism message board people.  There's plenty of legitimate Communists and Socialists in the western world.  Nice job calling all vocal conservatives idiots though.  I don't agree with anything most of them say, but I've certainly met some that had some lights on upstairs, they just reached different (that is, wrong) conclusions about things.  Plenty of idiots too; but I don't want to start an argument about conservative philosophies when the thread's already for Communists.

[Grakelin]

I think I would have to provide some of the published letters, editorials, etc. before you would actually believe me when I say that Canadian conservatives are doing at terrible job finding spokespeople who do their ideologies a service. Maybe it's a result of our culture being skewed more toward Socialism affecting our education system in such a way? I'd like to believe this, but moving from the Atlantic Region to a university town didn't stem the flow of inane comments (which don't always have to do with whatever opinion they're sharing) making their way into our letters to the editors.

[Aqizzar]

You cinched it with "university town".  Students latch on like lampreys to idiotic ideas across the political spectrum.  And the ones that wind up gravitating to the furthest ends overlap pretty heavily with the ones who feel motivated enough to write letters and hold events.  I have no experience with Canadian culture or politics at all, so I can't begin to respond.

Take to the streets and shout, "Be Reasonable!"  Moderate rage doesn't really work.

[Grakelin]

I go to a university full of engineers. Most of our university movements are based around ethnicity and actually oppose each other. Man, Israeli Apartheid week was such a nightmare here.

But no, there are still loads of ridiculous letters flying into The Chronicle Herald (Halifax) and The Dairy Creamer (Fredericton), where people either don't go to university or go to a bad one (or, if they're fortunate, go to Dartmouth University in Halifax). It's not always as politically charged, at least.

Four week letter to the editor storm had to be brought to a close in The Dairy Creamer in '07 or '08. People were really thrown into a rage over the latest issue which had just hit Fredericton. It even stopped people from writing in to act outraged about the city using good tax dollars on worthless things like traffic lights (no joke!) while they were storming the press offices and the media with this immoral, unethical epidemic.

Somebody had just introduced Samosas to the region, and people were cutting in line.


To be fair, I was in a Samosa line once, and that shit was serious business.

[Phmcw]

Hey, don't forget that political movement must evolve. Capitalism has evolved and so has communism (still not enough I think). For instance China's form of communism was certainly unexpected. Discussing Marx's idea of communism without taking into account the profound change into the society is stupid.

[Grakelin]

Also impossible, unless you made some sort of syntax error which caused me to misinterpret your post.

[Askot Bokbondeler]

China's form of communism was certainly unexpected.

and rather...uncommunistic in some opinions

[ChairmanPoo]

Allegedly anarch-communist communes worked fairly well in Catalonia. I dont know to what extent it's true...

Not well at all, because it was really nothing of the kind.  Catalonia was "Communist" the way most European countries then and now are trending, with strong social services, but plenty of private property rights.  They were only "anarchic" in that they were a city-state separated from any nation.  They still had an internal city government, with a strong police force, and social order kept by worker unions and so forth.  Also, it's a lot easier to get people to work together for the community good and share their property when you're a city-state threatened on all sides by a civil war, and there's not much property to share anyway.

They did nationalize the industry, however, which makes it rather different from modern european countries.

[Vester]

The point I tried to make is that it's not the (underway) Communism which destroys the economy.

Actually yes, yes it is. You seem to forget that at some point Castro had to fuck up royally enough to even begin taking money from Soviet Russia. That's because his system for implementing Communism failed utterly.

This is pretty glaring. It's because Batista royally fucked up the economy because he only cared about making money for himself and America. Castro then spent decades fixing it.

So I was reading through the thread, and it's fairly obvious that I know nothing about Cuban history, because this is the first thing I thought of:

[Cthulhu]

That's not who they were talking about?

[Jackrabbit]

Same douchebag levels though.

ohsnap