Yeah, that’s your rendition of it. And, in embracing it, you project [to me] as someone basically arguing that anyone who does not think and feel exactly the same way is [must be] wrong.
How can they not be when you are so fiercely certain that you are right? It’s either this or one or another variation of, “they’re right from their side, we’re right from ours.”
Then those on both sides [all sides] yank out sets of historical facts to bolster their claims. And then argue heatedly over what either was or was not “appropriate”.
Same thing regarding those who detest capitalism.
You act as if any response is reasonable.
On the contrary, my argument revolves more around the assumption that with respect to value judgments relating to such things as abortion and Communism, many sides are able to construct arguments which can be construed as reasonable given a particular set of assumptions about the human condition.
If, for example, human interactions are said to revolve more around “we” than “me”, then one or another rendition of socialism seems more reasonable. Unless, of course it is the other way around. Then, sure capitalism makes more sense.
So, how do philosophers, ethicists and political scientists finally pin that down? Given how the history of human interactions to date is bursting at the seams with examples of both points of departure.
Still others will argue that next time the revolution will be done right.
Sure. Do the same things but get a different result next time.
Yeah, that’s how the objectivists think about these things. It makes no difference what the new revolutionaries do because the damn thing is inherently broken. And they have the arguments to prove it.
Others will note that in nations like Russia and China the revolutions did not unfold in accordance with the official Marxist trajectory.
Not surprising since Marx made up all the stuff. You know “in his head”.
Note to others: What does this tell you about the sophistication of his thinking here?
The actual trajectory shows how quickly and easily the theory falls apart and the society becomes a totalitarian nightmare.
I am basically in agreement here. And that is because Marxism/socialism/Communism are objectivist frames of mind that can never be in sync with the manner in which I construe human interactions embedded existentially [and far more precariously] in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.
But how do I go about demonstrating that to those hell-bent on believing in that which enables them to ground “I” in the “real me” in sync with the “right thing to do”? It’s the secular equivalent of convincing the religious that there is no God. They simply have too much “comfort and consolation” invested in Him.
No existential holes for them!
And any revolution will beget these terrible things.
Oh really? You can’t have a significant change without the horrors and the terrors?
Not in a world where the significant changes embraced by some are construed as horrible and terrible by others.
In any event, that is a world embedded in democracy and the rule of law. And that in my view is a world that eschews both “might makes right” and “right makes might”.
Though there is still the part where those with the most wealth and power get to configure the actual existential parameters of this “best of all possible worlds”.
Sounds like your giving carte blanche to the revolutionaries. “Do whatever you want and you won’t be held accountable”.
No, I’m suggesting that those convinced that their revolution reflects [historically] the next “kingdom of ends”, will rationalize virually any behaviors in order to sustain the kingdom.
And then there are the moral nihilists who basically skip all that right and wrong stuff and cut to the chase: what’s in it for me?
And then [of course] there are all the terrible tales [and practices] that the Communists can disclose to us about the capitalist political economy.
This sounds like just bringing up the evils of capitalism makes the evils of communism “go away”.
You continue to misunderstand me. The Communists and the capitalists in the objectivist camps are generally authoritarians. The evils of the other side necessarily go away if the revolution is successful. In other words, the revolution [in a Hegelian sense] reflects “the final synthesis”. It’s just a matter of whether this synthesis is embedded more in materialism, idealism, or God.