Communism to fight poverty?
- Thread starter soulseeker
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It's economy is expanding at a rate faster than China. Not bad considering everyone else's is failing.
really? stats? (sorry, just curious)
[MENTION=489]soulseeker[/MENTION]: communism certainly has the potential to reduce poverty. (i'd need to read up a bit before answering this properly, but great thread.)
We are too animalistic for communism to work.
We need more years of society and conditioning
and evolution before we abandon that sense of I
and forget about the first pillar of evolution.
Communism sort of seems like the desire to
throw away that which helped us to climb
to the top of the food chain. Yes, it is plausible
now since we have altered our environment
drastically and have created a world in which
we control nearly everything.
I think eventually if we relied on communism
who is not to say that the animals and such
would not evolve as we did and become more
harsh and dominant. Obviously this would take
hundreds of thousand of years and we would
have to be oblivious but in a happy communistic
world you don't think of yourself and so you do
not view individual threats. And why would killing
animals be okay if killing humans is not?
Perhaps in eight hundred thousand more years
we will have finally become so civilized that we
are naturally born without a sense of I.
But Isaac Newton predicted the world is going to
end in 2060 so it's really not that much of a concern
to me.
We need more years of society and conditioning
and evolution before we abandon that sense of I
and forget about the first pillar of evolution.
Communism sort of seems like the desire to
throw away that which helped us to climb
to the top of the food chain. Yes, it is plausible
now since we have altered our environment
drastically and have created a world in which
we control nearly everything.
I think eventually if we relied on communism
who is not to say that the animals and such
would not evolve as we did and become more
harsh and dominant. Obviously this would take
hundreds of thousand of years and we would
have to be oblivious but in a happy communistic
world you don't think of yourself and so you do
not view individual threats. And why would killing
animals be okay if killing humans is not?
Perhaps in eight hundred thousand more years
we will have finally become so civilized that we
are naturally born without a sense of I.
But Isaac Newton predicted the world is going to
end in 2060 so it's really not that much of a concern
to me.
don't you think it wouldn't work because it's just replacing a ruling class with something else.
[FONT="]Marx proposes making a totalitarian worker's state in order for society to implement the policies he suggested in his Communist Manifesto until such a time that the State is no longer needed when it becomes a worker's paradise.
[/FONT]so it's like you didn't actually abolish the ruling class. You just replaced it with another ruling class. And may become even worse because you can't own private lands and the like. So isn't the idea some what contradictory?
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[FONT="]Marx proposes making a totalitarian worker's state in order for society to implement the policies he suggested in his Communist Manifesto until such a time that the State is no longer needed when it becomes a worker's paradise.
[/FONT]so it's like you didn't actually abolish the ruling class. You just replaced it with another ruling class. And may become even worse because you can't own private lands and the like. So isn't the idea some what contradictory?
[FONT="]
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Right; human beings are too inherently selfish to make the ideals behind communism work... perhaps after a few more million years of social evolution.
And yeah, china proclaims to be communist, but they're more of a capitalistic dictatorship, which just goes to show that capitalism is not equal to democracy, in spite of american claims to the contrary.
And yeah, china proclaims to be communist, but they're more of a capitalistic dictatorship, which just goes to show that capitalism is not equal to democracy, in spite of american claims to the contrary.
Communism seems like such an attractive option in poor countries with corrupt leadership because as Marx said the proletariat have only their chains to lose. In the west we have experienced a certain degree of comfort, however in a globalised world this has come at the cost of people in other countries who have ben exploited, whether as slaves, cheap labour, taxation or the robbing of their natural resources. I think as the standard of living in the west suffers due to 'austerity measures' under capitalism many people will begin to question the validity of the current system. People may begin to look at other options and socialism will grow in popularity.
I don't think that overthrowing an oppressive regime and replacing it with another one is a good idea. I don't believe in overthrowing the capitalist class and then replacing it with a 'dictatorship of the proletariat'
Many people seem to believe that countries such as China, Russia and Cuba are socialist states. That isn't true. China and Russia have replaced capitalism by the capitalist class with capitalism by the state. However socialism like capitalism requires to be global to work. Therefore countries may perhaps have retained centralised power structures due to the threat of exploitation from outside capitalist countries. This however means that they retain the problems which come with centralised power: corruption and oppression (you see this in capitalist and 'communist' countries).
The left is divided on what they believe the ideal system is and how to achieve it. Personally i believe that socialism means the common ownership of the means of production and the abolition of money. After all money isn't real, it is an illusion designed to empower some and enslave others.
If you abolish money you get rid in a stroke of all the non-jobs dependent on it and you are only left with jobs that are directly useful or beneficial to society. Because you have freed up a massive part of the work force, these workers can then go and help those workers already involved in the real economy of production and distribution; this means that everyone would then have to work a whole lot less as 'many hands make light work'. In a socialist country people might only have to work several hours a day instead of the capitalist 8+ working day
Socialism believes that everyone should have a say (consensus democracy) at regular workers councils. Socialism believes that people should work voluntarily and that power should be held by the people and exercised upwards by means of delegates who represent the worker at the higher level and are instantly revocable if they do not fulfill their mandate; this means that government is no longer needed. Capitalism however believes in power exercised from the top down, which essentially means rule by the rich who then have to constantly deceive the people in order to keep power over them.
Capitalism is driven by profits and this requires the creation and satisfaction of wants and is therefore wasteful. Socialism focuss on needs and is therefore less wasteful. The evidence of the unsustainability of capitalism is all around us: damage to environment and dwindling resources.
Socialism believes in the contribution of people according to their ability and the receiveing back according to the need. This means that people are supplied with what they need, whereas with capitalism people are supplied with whatever they can get hold of; because of the imbalance of wealth this means that resources are not shared round effectively or fairly.
Socialism is about cooperation which tends to lead to peace, whereas capitalism is about competition which tends to lead towards violence and deceit as can be evidenced by all the conflict around the world
Capitalism has lead to slavery, oppression, economic crisis, environmental disaster and the danger of nuclear war. The stakes have never been higher for humanity and I would argue that argument is not one about whether or not we should adapt to socialism but rather one of when and how should we adopt to socialism
However I believe that the worlds financial elites will not hand over their power to the people. They are pursuing other options which would enable them to hold onto power and would see the retention of the current social order and imbalance in wealth
I believe the path to socialism should be a peaceful one. I think it should be achieved by growing awareness of the faults of capitalism and the common sense approach offered by socialism.
http://www.worldsocialism.org/index.php
I don't think that overthrowing an oppressive regime and replacing it with another one is a good idea. I don't believe in overthrowing the capitalist class and then replacing it with a 'dictatorship of the proletariat'
Many people seem to believe that countries such as China, Russia and Cuba are socialist states. That isn't true. China and Russia have replaced capitalism by the capitalist class with capitalism by the state. However socialism like capitalism requires to be global to work. Therefore countries may perhaps have retained centralised power structures due to the threat of exploitation from outside capitalist countries. This however means that they retain the problems which come with centralised power: corruption and oppression (you see this in capitalist and 'communist' countries).
The left is divided on what they believe the ideal system is and how to achieve it. Personally i believe that socialism means the common ownership of the means of production and the abolition of money. After all money isn't real, it is an illusion designed to empower some and enslave others.
If you abolish money you get rid in a stroke of all the non-jobs dependent on it and you are only left with jobs that are directly useful or beneficial to society. Because you have freed up a massive part of the work force, these workers can then go and help those workers already involved in the real economy of production and distribution; this means that everyone would then have to work a whole lot less as 'many hands make light work'. In a socialist country people might only have to work several hours a day instead of the capitalist 8+ working day
Socialism believes that everyone should have a say (consensus democracy) at regular workers councils. Socialism believes that people should work voluntarily and that power should be held by the people and exercised upwards by means of delegates who represent the worker at the higher level and are instantly revocable if they do not fulfill their mandate; this means that government is no longer needed. Capitalism however believes in power exercised from the top down, which essentially means rule by the rich who then have to constantly deceive the people in order to keep power over them.
Capitalism is driven by profits and this requires the creation and satisfaction of wants and is therefore wasteful. Socialism focuss on needs and is therefore less wasteful. The evidence of the unsustainability of capitalism is all around us: damage to environment and dwindling resources.
Socialism believes in the contribution of people according to their ability and the receiveing back according to the need. This means that people are supplied with what they need, whereas with capitalism people are supplied with whatever they can get hold of; because of the imbalance of wealth this means that resources are not shared round effectively or fairly.
Socialism is about cooperation which tends to lead to peace, whereas capitalism is about competition which tends to lead towards violence and deceit as can be evidenced by all the conflict around the world
Capitalism has lead to slavery, oppression, economic crisis, environmental disaster and the danger of nuclear war. The stakes have never been higher for humanity and I would argue that argument is not one about whether or not we should adapt to socialism but rather one of when and how should we adopt to socialism
However I believe that the worlds financial elites will not hand over their power to the people. They are pursuing other options which would enable them to hold onto power and would see the retention of the current social order and imbalance in wealth
I believe the path to socialism should be a peaceful one. I think it should be achieved by growing awareness of the faults of capitalism and the common sense approach offered by socialism.
http://www.worldsocialism.org/index.php
Bullshit, have you been there? I have. The middle class is growing like crazy in China... of course middle class in China LOOKs like upper class, but their middle class is much like our own in terms of what they do and what they have.
Simplified forms of communism seemed to work alright for the Native Tribes in the Americas. To them communal and collective living was natural, and the idea that someone could "own" a part of the earth was ridiculous.
I don't know about know about the elder's thing, care to share some info?
Don't we constantly war with other nations in our "advanced society"?
Women actually had many more rights than did most European women of the time, and many tribes had women in positions of power. Enslaved children? Their wars and aggressions were also often times settled in small skirmishes like mourning war in the Iroquois league. War was usually avoided, they weren't "savages" as they are often times remembered.
Also, yes they lived like nomads, and they also missed out on a lot of pleasant symptoms of advanced society like stress, anxiety, and suicide. I guess that happens though when you are thousands of years behind the rest of the world because you ancestors moved away from the Fertile Crescent before science and animal husbandry really came into being.
Uhh from what I recall of the stories of the Native Americans in my area, one tribe came through and massacred and enslaved the majority of the scattered smaller tribes in the area. Then there were like the Aztecs and Mayas etc.
I always love when people pull up silly factoids about some group from some time and compare and contrast to other group to make the technologically inferior group seem more advanced.
My personal favorite was when in one of my world civilization courses the teacher who was rabidly anti capitalism and western civ used to harp over and over about how much more advanced the Muslims were, because they "bathed" more often then their European counterparts. Apparently ablution to your face, nostrils, neck and hands up to your elbows counts as bathing. Even though they never used soap...
But yeah, they had the right system going, worked out great for them.
I always love when people pull up silly factoids about some group from some time and compare and contrast to other group to make the technologically inferior group seem more advanced.
My personal favorite was when in one of my world civilization courses the teacher who was rabidly anti capitalism and western civ used to harp over and over about how much more advanced the Muslims were, because they "bathed" more often then their European counterparts. Apparently ablution to your face, nostrils, neck and hands up to your elbows counts as bathing. Even though they never used soap...
But yeah, they had the right system going, worked out great for them.
Does it also apply to the reverse when one tries to make the technologically inferior group look bad? Because........
Yeah, and you want to talk about what the civilized world of the same time period did?
It did for the thousands of years before the Europeans came. Then again, being thousands of years behind in science, but more importantly auto-immune systems (because their ancestors moved from the Fertile Crescent before animal husbandry came into being, and thus before any humans were exposed to any strain of poxes, let alone small pox) kinda doesn't let a thriving culture stand up well against another culture thriving in science and technology.
Calling native american massacres and butchers warmongers. wrong but accurate, check.
Calling European massacres and butchers and warmongers good and accurate. check.
the NA's are often painted in history today as pacifists and environmentalists. Europeans as the evil boogieman who ruined the world with Capitalism. The reality is that both groups were identical, they were groups of random humans who killed for profit and survived the best way they knew how. Its the politicizing and changing of history that offends me.
Thats ALL anyone talks about... are you serious?
Yeah I guess that they couldn't repel the invading peoples, it obviously didn't, otherwise they would have put up better resistance. Err Small Pox killed Europeans too. I believe it was the average cold that murdered the South Americans, not that the Natives didn't introduce new diseases to the Europeans too. Like Syphilis.
There is not enough conflict for communism to work in our modern day society.
That aside, communism cant give people the comfort they find in middle class society. Now if there were some way to give everyone their own plot of land to farm/ do business from/ just live (tax free of course) you would get my attention because I think that is key to living a high standard of life.
That aside, communism cant give people the comfort they find in middle class society. Now if there were some way to give everyone their own plot of land to farm/ do business from/ just live (tax free of course) you would get my attention because I think that is key to living a high standard of life.