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[x2yzh9]

On socialism economically: Socialism promotes forcing those who have attended college and learned how to be contributing members of society to support those who simply don't work. See "On Communism Morally"

On communism Economically: Doomed to failure. No system which punishes the able in order to enrich the inable can ever succeed if the able do not want to be shackled to the less productive. Communism leads to laziness as, regardless of effort, everyone still recieves the same number of food tickets. (As communism would see everyone fed that way, clothed with tickets, housed with tickets...) This means as everyone would work less because they don't have to work to get paid the economy would collapse due to the lack of productive labour. (See USSR, North Korea, Maoist China) Also all the creative minds would flee because they would not be albe to research as they would be told to go work in some factory "for the good of the people" and their protests to the opposite. Make no mistake, communism is tyranny, it advocates forcing everyone to do what some beauraucrat tells them to do, without leaving them any court of appeal, as they would simply be told it is "for the greater good"

On Communism Morally: Despicable. Violates your right to spend your time as you wish. Enslaves everyone to "the greater good" something which is ultimately indescribable, and so can be used to justify any horrible act those in power dream up. Then there is the fact that communism inevitably has to be backed up by some sort of gestapo as it fails in the face of sustained public discourse as they watch their quality of living go to shit around their ears. This leads to concentration camps and starving 20 million Ukrainians to death.

Now, contrary to what you may think after that I am not fascist. I am Libertarian. All the above would be true of fascism if you replaces "the people" with "the state" and "20 million Ukrainians" with "11 million jews, slavs, gypsies, gay, plotical prisoners (Oh wait, communists killed masses of political prisoners too)"

It may force you to support those who don't work, but what about the people who can't? What about the people that don't have a job?

Wrong. The people with better minds would instead be directed to a research position. They would still get the same resources and so on for them, but would instead be working on what they are best at. Communist nations aren't 100% factorys.

In communism, there is (from my understanding) supposed to be no leader, but not anarchy. Everyone is supposed to govern the entire people.

I think you're confusing communists with Stalin.

[PenguinOverlord]

On socialism economically: Socialism promotes forcing those who have attended college and learned how to be contributing members of society to support those who simply don't work. See "On Communism Morally"

On communism Economically: Doomed to failure. No system which punishes the able in order to enrich the inable can ever succeed if the able do not want to be shackled to the less productive. Communism leads to laziness as, regardless of effort, everyone still recieves the same number of food tickets. (As communism would see everyone fed that way, clothed with tickets, housed with tickets...) This means as everyone would work less because they don't have to work to get paid the economy would collapse due to the lack of productive labour. (See USSR, North Korea, Maoist China) Also all the creative minds would flee because they would not be albe to research as they would be told to go work in some factory "for the good of the people" and their protests to the opposite. Make no mistake, communism is tyranny, it advocates forcing everyone to do what some beauraucrat tells them to do, without leaving them any court of appeal, as they would simply be told it is "for the greater good"

On Communism Morally: Despicable. Violates your right to spend your time as you wish. Enslaves everyone to "the greater good" something which is ultimately indescribable, and so can be used to justify any horrible act those in power dream up. Then there is the fact that communism inevitably has to be backed up by some sort of gestapo as it fails in the face of sustained public discourse as they watch their quality of living go to shit around their ears. This leads to concentration camps and starving 20 million Ukrainians to death.

Now, contrary to what you may think after that I am not fascist. I am Libertarian. All the above would be true of fascism if you replaces "the people" with "the state" and "20 million Ukrainians" with "11 million jews, slavs, gypsies, gay, plotical prisoners (Oh wait, communists killed masses of political prisoners too)"

It may force you to support those who don't work, but what about the people who can't? What about the people that don't have a job?

Wrong. The people with better minds would instead be directed to a research position. They would still get the same resources and so on for them, but would instead be working on what they are best at. Communist nations aren't 100% factorys.

In communism, there is (from my understanding) supposed to be no leader, but not anarchy. Everyone is supposed to govern the entire people.

I think you're confusing communists with Stalin.

"Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

[x2yzh9]

Penguin, what exactly are you trying to say here?

[Criptfeind]

Bluh bluh bluh humans are not ants.

Oh wait, I was beaten to it in the first reply. Why is this conversation taking place?

[Realmfighter]

Because this is Bay Twelve, the most argumentative place on earth?

[Criptfeind]

I would think give some of our other attitudes we would be way to dead set vs the pinko commie fascist new way satanist atheist hippies to have much to argue about.

...

Forgot old people killers.

[Majestic7]

Well, democratic socialism is clearly the greatest success story of the last century. If we look at what nations are on the top on all human developement meters, they are all Euro countries which included socialist policies (meaning social policies) in their framework. In many cases, it was even conservative parties who applied these policies, because they were obviously needed. Things like state-funded education and healthcare, social safety network and labor rights. Besides, isn't having governmental firefighters socialism too? In the bad old days firefighters were private companies and mysteriously there were lots of fires around.

If we look at the birth of Nordic social welfare states, the roots are in the threat of Communism. Not in Commies being in power, but in the political fighting (and actual civil war in case of Finland) between the burgeois, the conservatives and the commies. This created tension, where the social policies bloomed as compromises. These compromises clearly work out better than any of the extreme policies.

So I'd say, politically what is needed is balance between the left and the right to work out something that provides good results for everyone. Unfortunately, right now conservatives and libertarians are leading the show and many social democratic parties (like Labour in UK under Blair) turned into some kind of...watered down right-wing parties. Thus the old social policies are being dismantled and it is increasing poverty and cutting away the benefits they once brought, leaving just impotent and expensive bureaucracy that exists for the sake of itself.

Edit - I forgot to add that the people who benefit most from the social policies and social justice are not the poor. They are the middle class, especially upper middle class. There is shitload of studies on the subject - they send their kids to enjoy higher education, they use the state-funded services the most, they save money on healthcare and safety they'd otherwise need to spend. Everyone is always crying about the unemployed and bla bla, but while the system means they don't need to sell their ass in the street corner, that isn't even the main focus. So when middle class voters act against the system, they are pissing on their own interests and it is just sad.

[Cthulhu]

I didn't even read the OP (after the first sentence) because I heard this all last year from a sophomore in shop.

ToonyMan is BestMan.

[Frajic]

Well, democratic socialism is clearly the greatest success story of the last century. If we look at what nations are on the top on all human developement meters, they are all Euro countries which included socialist policies (meaning social policies) in their framework. In many cases, it was even conservative parties who applied these policies, because they were obviously needed. Things like state-funded education and healthcare, social safety network and labor rights. Besides, isn't having governmental firefighters socialism too? In the bad old days firefighters were private companies and mysteriously there were lots of fires around.

If we look at the birth of Nordic social welfare states, the roots are in the threat of Communism. Not in Commies being in power, but in the political fighting (and actual civil war in case of Finland) between the burgeois, the conservatives and the commies. This created tension, where the social policies bloomed as compromises. These compromises clearly work out better than any of the extreme policies.

So I'd say, politically what is needed is balance between the left and the right to work out something that provides good results for everyone. Unfortunately, right now conservatives and libertarians are leading the show and many social democratic parties (like Labour in UK under Blair) turned into some kind of...watered down right-wing parties. Thus the old social policies are being dismantled and it is increasing poverty and cutting away the benefits they once brought, leaving just impotent and expensive bureaucracy that exists for the sake of itself.

Edit - I forgot to add that the people who benefit most from the social policies and social justice are not the poor. They are the middle class, especially upper middle class. There is shitload of studies on the subject - they send their kids to enjoy higher education, they use the state-funded services the most, they save money on healthcare and safety they'd otherwise need to spend. Everyone is always crying about the unemployed and bla bla, but while the system means they don't need to sell their ass in the street corner, that isn't even the main focus. So when middle class voters act against the system, they are pissing on their own interests and it is just sad.

I have first-hand experience of this; it's doing wonders in Norway. So I agree 100%.
Also, to people complaining it "rewards laying on the couch and watching TV all day": you don't get much money, so you're gonna be living a poor, boring life if you don't work. Still think people will choose this?

[Twiggie]

surely if you simply ensure an entirely equal level of education across all branches of a society then capitalism works just fine. other than nepotism, and family connections, etc. but as long as you ensure you dont lose any potential geniuses to a lifetime of working in macdonalds its fine. ish.

[Eugenitor]

On socialism economically: Socialism promotes forcing those who have attended college and learned how to be contributing members of society to support those who simply don't work.

As opposed to the current system, which effectively forces those who have attended college and learned how to be contributing members of society to support those who screw them over. There are people who work full-time in this country, 40 hours a week, to actively make things worse for other people. Insurance companies have warehouses full of "claims adjusters" whose job it is to deny people the health care they thought they were getting. Telemarketer shitholes open up in places with high unemployment, seeking another sucker to piss people off. Lots of people work full-time trying to sell people things they don't need. And then there's the rich ne'er-do-wells, the ones busy making bonuses selling credit default swaps, cooking books, and screwing up mortgages en masse. It would be better for everyone if they were all unemployed and living off the government dole instead, free to slack off as they liked. Why not? They don't make or do anything useful anyway, and yet there's still a roof over their heads and food in their bellies.

Actually a real socialist economy with an eye towards post-scarcity and freedom from want would let the bankers play with money as they pleased. CDSes and CDOs at a quadrillion dollars, far more than the value of the entire world? Here you guys go- have another quintillion to play with, now you get to have even more fun! It's not real money; it never was. So they can enjoy their little games to their little hearts' content, and the rest of us can spend our days dealing with industry and infrastructure.

[Muz]

I generally agree with the OP. Except that I don't believe in Communism. Communism needs way too much overhead and is very prone to corruption. It works in dwarf fortress, but in reality, way too difficult to implement.

IMO, capitalism is sort of like feudalism with a bit of meritocracy mixed in, in that the exceptionally skilled will be able to work up the social ladder. If you're born rich, you stay rich. An idiot born into a rich family ends up doing degrees in mass communications, business, commerce, or a language, and stays in the middle class at worst. Contacts matter way more in a capitalist economy, so that middle class guy who knows a few business contacts will be able to make a lot of money with little work. Most of the socialist world views education as an indication of intelligence, and that's because it takes actual hard work and competency to get a good degree, not money.

Trickle down economy exaggerates this effect of capitalism. Heck, if you have full trickle down economy, it'd probably be the same as feudalism. You have large areas of USA that are just as poor and stuck in poverty as many of the African nations they look down on. Try and find as many slums in democratic socialist countries.

That and the income tax model in many all out capitalist countries actually hurts the upper middle class the most - that is, the professional doctors, lawyers, and engineers who keep the nation functioning. Socialism also hits them about as hard here, but the good part is that with the free/cheap education/health care, they're much happier giving back to society.

So far, socialism throughout the world works. Capitalists have a lot more money, but socialist countries tend to be much happier as a whole. And the whole point of money is to make people happy.


But yeah, no point in arguing this. People just go bleh.. obama is socialist and he made the country broke. (ignoring the fact that expenses aren't as damn high in socialist countries)

[Labs]

This is the [CENSOR]. Security teams have been dispatched to your locations. You will all be arrested and sent to [CENSOR] for re-education. Remember, Communism equals oppresion. We here at [CENSOR] have your best intrests at heart and only wish to further the one true economic system; Capitalism.

[Zrk2]

Communism and Socialism do not work because their basic premise invloves moral inequality. You appear to agree that everyone should be treated equally, yet you advocate taking from one person and giving it to another, and claiming it is your right. This means that you are actually saying that those who are poor are morally more important than those who are not poor.

[Bauglir]

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