Yeah, so you’ll have anarchy for a little while, then eventually a state will reemerge. It’s not a faith in the system, it’s an understanding of human nature.
The hunter gatherer period lasted ten thousand years. Events unfolding within each year has the possibility of destroying modern civilization knocking back humanity to the stone age. You never know…
I’ll settle for seventy five to a hundred years in my lifetime. If only I can be so lucky. Well, here’s to hope anyways…
This whole kind cares what each other thinks, and they are the majority.
Consider the huge popularity of tabloids and trash magazines.
A phenomenon for you: consider internet forums, including this one. It’s the flawed arguments that attract the most attention and get the most publicity. Further, it’s mainly stupidity that ends them - a stubbornness on the part of the loudest shouter, and the stupidity of others in dealing with such people.
And no, my evaluation of my abilities is little less than summing up the scientific method with regard to a specific subject.
I’m interested in relatively restricting people who are proven to be economically irresponsible, and relatively liberating those who are economically responsible. The current degree of justice in social matters is fine by me for now, though that is not to say it doesn’t need improvement - just that I have little concern for it compared to our massive economic problems.
I do not worship ideals, such as “freedom”, which is meaningless unless qualified and applied to real life.
Marx wasn’t the only anti-Capitalist.
I don’t buy all of Marx’s arguments, and I’ve only even read one of his books fully.
I even have sympathy for ideologies incompatible with his.
If you are trying to crudely summarise of my position as “Problem = Capitalism” and “Belief = Socialism” therefore “Silhouette = Marxist” then you’re guilty of being ignorant, lazy and wrong. A pre-mature eagerness to box people into pre-existing categories for the sake of either dismissing or condoning them will not serve you when it comes to all-important distinctions as well as finer details that can make all the difference.
I’m not a revolutionary, which is essential to Leninist/Trotskyist Socialism. I am concerned with the politics of change to something co-operative, and Marx wrote no concrete political plans. Whether you meant your label as derogatory of not, it doesn’t sufficiently fit. In fact it does more harm towards understanding my position than good.
For indirect democracy, yes.
If you’re only going to consider the past then you’re only as good as a Conservative or any other reactionary. Why would I be interested in repeating something that has failed exactly how it was done before? Learning from it is fine, but expecting the past to be a complete set of possibilities for each broad label so far conceived is just an argument for things staying the same.
“Playing mean” is using deception and abusing power imbalance to take from others more than you give back to the point that so many are so restricted and trapped in their poverty, whilst some are so ridiculously rich that they are more powerful than their government and able to essentially direct the politics of entire countries.
I agree that people who are physically “being the change they want to see in the world” are the most impressive. I do this in the intellectual realm, and as such, my powers are limited compared to those who physically act out their plans. But they need direction and confirmation, which I can provide. My purpose here is to iron out difficult points that are well guarded so as to help others understand them and apply them to their own lives.
Concerning the welfare State - in conjunction with modern Capitalism and neo-liberal values it was always a combination doomed to fail. But the State is a much more obvious target for the failure of such a concoction than an obscured though simple ideology that requires a modicum of intellectual consideration in order to understand it.
Importantly, the welfare-State is not actually Socialist. It’s a very American propaganda move to associate an element of a conflicting ideology to their own failing system, and then blame that. Socialism is distinct from modern Capitalism, there is no overlap. It’s not a sliding scale of “more Capitalist vs. more Socialist”.
Yet another deception for me to clarify for the benefit of others ^
I’m a little curious about that one.
Do elaborate.
Ok, I believe I’ve covered it before while you’ve been around but maybe you missed it.
Riddle me this, Batman:
How can an economic state in its own right (no pun intended) defined as coming after Capitalism has been undone, as distinct from and incompatible with Capitalism, co-exist with/along-side Capitalism?
It was Marx who defined the necessary sequential historical conditions that must be met in order for Socialism to come about and exist.
It was Lenin who necessitated revolution’s role in violently seizing control of the State in order to make it function as a body of armed men whose sole purpose is to prevent counter-revolution and nothing more. Formerly capitalist institutions are taken over by their own workers who need only to do their own work just as before, just without suffering someone else making money from the work that they are the ones actually doing. Using money to make money is outlawed, only using money as a means to consume is permitted: aka there only being one class of people - those who work for their money, and no longer those who make money from others working for their money. So personal property is fine, only the means of production become owned by the people (as distinct from being “publically” owned in the sense of being controlled by an indirectly democratically elected elite known today as “the State”). Does any of this (apart from what I just put in brackets) sound remotely like what we have today?
Has Capitalism ended? Have we had such a revolution as I describe? No? Then we don’t yet have any “degree” of Socialism at all.
Not even in Russia did Capitalism first occur and then get pushed through to its inevitable limits before turning into Socialism.
Neither did China go through any of these necessary processes.
What they had/have is an authoritarian totalitarian dictatorship, which is something entirely distinct from Socialism.
Sorry I asked.
As I expected, some people have a “word salad” problem.
You seem to have a “thought salad” problem.
Something that I have to keep reminding myself of is that to socialist, “socialist = anything and everything good” and “capitalist = anything and everything bad”, despite having no idea of good from bad because “it is all relative and subjective”.
Lol!
What was that about “word salad”?
If you find Marxist and Leninist definitions too difficult, which are all I’m relaying, then of course Socialism is going to go over your head. It’s a shame, because if you understood, you would agree. It’s basically an improved version of your own politics.
That is all a good description of Communism (of which Socialism is an approaching state) but unfortunately it is based on a horrible mistake.
“The People” does not exist as an entity.
You can not have “The Means Of Production” (also not an entity) owned by “The People”.
Two categorical mistakes in one plan.
No fucking wonder it produced arguably the most horrific travesties in the Earths history.
Economy can not be based on anything other than individuals.
These do not exist in Marx’ universe. He thinks they do but he describes completely different entities. He did not understand the most basic thing about humanity and he didn’t think through the requirements of industry, among which is cooperation based on personal trust.
Marx basically said “Man can not be trusted with power” and “we require that all men trust each other with power”.
Fuck him. Belief in God is a thousand times more rational than to believe in “The People” as an agent of anything except human nature.
Desire for wealth and power is human nature. So is desire to share and be fruitful. If you want to take the second and kill the first, you will represent the first and kill the second. So logic tells anyone who considers the means that have to be used, and so history has proven. Get over this idiotic idea and start from the ground up, with logic, philosophy, value-psychology.
You cannot put an elephant on an airplane.
Also, you can’t have personal property being privately owned with the means of production being controlled “By the People”.
Controlling the means of production means controlling what is produced, how much of it, where, under what circumstances, and who it can be sold to and for how much.
You end up with a world where everybody gets their grey jumpsuit, food ration, state-approved entertainment, living quarters, and happy pills. At that point, who gives a shit if they are 'truly yours' or not? Did workers back in the day truly own the company scrip the received for their labor and could only spend at the company store?
Private ownership of wealth entails the freedom to exchange that wealth as one sees fit, which entails free market driven economics. My wealth is only worth something because there are people competing to provide things I want to spend it on.
Bingo!
Pass the man a prize. =D>
Although…
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0YRDLMfYxw[/youtube]
and
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNgst8PHfLI[/youtube]
“Cannot below what cost?”
Do-ability and affordability are different things… to most people.
Also true.
Apparently as soon as you back up an idea, you are a ist.
TO ALL: ^ Please pay attention ^
I’ll say it again, I’m neither a Socialist nor a Marxist - I just happen to know stuff about these doctrines that basically everyone on this so-called philosophy forum does not, ESPECIALLY the most vehement detractors from these ideas.
Which pisses me off monumentally.
My bad for using a couple of bits of terminology that I know to be well-defined, but which are frequently used colloquially and irresponsibly by those who don’t know what they’re talking about, and therefore if I use them too I am just as irresponsible and lacking in concrete definition.
No, a group of people are not a single person - I know that. But there is existence in the collective group behaviour of individuals that does not exist when these people are by themselves. A group of people can interract in a very real and existent way, just as organs and cells do in a single human body. Oh, if only the air between us were solid and visible such that individual people could be seen as part of something greater than what they see as themselves, without which they could not continue to be individuals…
The means of production include all individual entities that workers interract with in order to produce something (no shit). Instead of referring to each individual item on the list, for some crazy reason we just say “the means of production” instead.
An artifact of language is not why the USSR etc. happened. I’m well aware that some pretty shitty stuff happened in the name of Socialism and/or Communism. All but a minority of Socialists/Communists are against these things. Seriously, go ask your nearest Socialist “Are you a Stalinist?” or “Are you a Maoist?” etc. They will almost all say no. And why? Because they’re Socialists and/or Communists, and not Authoritarian Totalitarian dictatorship proponents. Go figure. I feel like I’m one of the 99% of Muslims being wrongly accused of terrorism and literal fundamentalism.
I disagree (N.B. even though I am neither a Marxist nor a Socialist).
No he didn’t.
So simple, so true.
Very well said.
Er, yes you can.
Just because all the machinery and electronics etc. (means of production) at my workplace aren’t mine, doesn’t mean I don’t own my own bed and toothbrush.
Sure, why not? And if something is collectively owned, then they all have a say in how they control it… as opposed to if something is individually owned, only one person has a say in how he or she controls it.
It’s not rocket science.
No. You don’t. That’s the movie Nineteen Eighty-Four.
Sure, if you don’t have the economic prohibition to use what you own in order to make more wealth/money, and a non market-led economy.
You wrote this bit backwards, the causation’s all wrong.
Perhaps you’re trying to make the argument that ownership is not ownership without complete control over anything and everything that you can do with your property. To which I respond: under the freest market, you still cannot square a circle. There are always restrictions. “Which ones?” is the only question.
If something is individually owned, then nobody else SHOULD have a say in how he or she controls it. But if what they are doing with their property is creating a product to sell, then by definition the people they want to sell to have a say on if they buy the product or not. If the State decides that we only need one kind of toothpaste, then I get the choice of buying it, or letting my teeth rot (possibly both).
It's also the reality of earning company scrip, which is analogous to what you're talking about. If the same entity that is issuing you your currency is dictating everything there is available to buy with it and how much it costs, then your economic freedom is a lie, and with it goes any real sense of 'wealth'.
No, that would be stupid. Only libertarians, Marxists, and Sith lords deal in absolutes.
True enough. If I have a dollar, and I can either spent it in a society where multiple companies are competing to provide me with the most appealing product, or I can spent it in a society where the State or "the people" are determining what I'm allowed to buy based on what they've decided is the best for society, I know who is getting my dollar. And I know how everybody else on earth with the sense to understand the choice is spending their dollar too...which is why Marxist (or 'Marxesque' to avoid that whole thing again) systems always require a totalitarian regime that outlaws capitalism, and capitalist societies can fully allow companies and individuals to behave in a socialist way if they choose to.
That's an important point- there is absolutely nothing in American law preventing a bunch of people from getting together and running their company or their lives as though socialism is the law of the land, nothing except [i]the fact that it sucks.[/i] It has to be imposed because nobody would do it by choice. The only advantage of State socialism over community socialism is that State socialism gives you a greater pool of other people's money to spend, so it takes longer for the inherent suckiness to manifest.
The piston will never know who is driving the car, nor who decided to junk it.
It naturally assumes that it is the one doing all of the work and thus in charge.
“Without me, you get nowhere!!”
“Emm…hmm…”
I haven’t called you anything at all.
I was discussing psychological principles and the assumptions implicit in a doctrine, not you.
What matters is how you understand these doctrines and how you present this understanding. No one cares what you vote.
Define “definition”.
I disagree with the notions on which the doctrinal definition is based, I either loathe or fear the states that define the theory in practice.
“Just as organs and cells in a single human body”
If you see humans primarily as a part of a whole, instead of primarily as individual and self-determining, then you are a totalitarian, a socialist, a transhumanist.
I see humans as entities to whom any political or economic whole they belong to is a matter of choice, of character.
Then you acknowledge the logical mistake but use it as a rule anyway.
Proper definitions do not rank very highly in your conception of logic, I see.
A bit eerie, Silhouette.
I see you no longer care to present an argument for your opinion.
…
Case closed?
It’s really annoying that Das Experiment was banned. He’s the only leftist that keeps making it difficult on the Constitutionalist. The only one who has actually read the relevant Marxist literature, and understands that there is a point to it beyond Marx himself, whom he knows to be, on the whole, a fool. Marxism is primarily a sentiment. There is no logic involved in the basic doctrine, but people have had good ideas on account of it.
Huzzah.
The incredibly naive presumption that contribution does not require a definition of value.
“Use value” is Marxism idea.
Use to what end?
Use to whom?
Use in stead of which other uses?
The list goes on indefinitely, and it becomes more perverse the more I think about it.
The criterium use to define the value of a human life effort… what else could result from it than Auschwitz and the Gulag?
I see socialism in context of human effort as a form of Christianity, nobility in as far as the Proletariat is capable of it.
In state-form it remains wholly consistent with the proletarian attitude - an uneducated guess as to what is of value to the happy man.
I’m more hung up on the word ‘distribution’- the idea that there is some power or another that has everything, and is in the position to decide who gets what and why. I could care less about the criteria, that there is a presumption of an It doing the distributing is enough for me to balk.
People do not “belong” to groups.
Groups are merely agreements amongst the people.
The only concern is “Who or what is making our mutual agreements for us?”