discussion Communism vs Capitalism Jubilee

[Kassi]

41 minutes ago, wastedpotential said:

Well the first rule of debating any self-proclaimed communist is heading off the "well, real communism has never been successfully implemented before" line, which is, for the most part true. Where I think we disagree is that I consider the repeated catastrophic results of the attempted implementations enough of a reason to not try in the first place. 

Ha! Good point. The easiest rebuttal to that talking point is: a system that only works if it's perfect is doomed to failure from the start.

 

Unfortunately for "real communism" sympathizers, human beings are flawed. And you simply cannot make a perfect system out of a collection of flawed parts.

[barbiegrande]

Anyone in 2024 still hoping the US can one day become a communist nation is wasting their time. It’s never going to happen. It’s more useful to try to regulate capitalism. 

[Bloo]

3 hours ago, Kassi said:

Being a CEO is not a common skillset.

The richest man in the world is a literal manchild that cries about "woke ideology" on a social media platform her bought and is actively destroying. His lack of skill for being a leader has not prevented him from amassing more wealth than anyone alive. This idea that CEOs are inherently skilled is laughable.

[Kassi]

2 minutes ago, Bloo said:

The richest man in the world is a literal manchild that cries about "woke ideology" on a social media platform her bought and is actively destroying. His lack of skill for being a leader has not prevented him from amassing more wealth than anyone alive. This idea that CEOs are inherently skilled is laughable.

A bulk of which is a result of government backed subsidies. Do you now see the dangers in government picking winners and losers? 

 

That loser should have crumbled under the weight of his own stupidity.

[Communion]

8 minutes ago, Kassi said:

Yes, accepting capitalism means accepting that life is inherently unfair.

 

55 minutes ago, Communion said:

It's interesting how this must mean by happenchance all the smartest, most talented, and luckiest people are all consolidated into a very selective handful of nations in the world. 

 

 

So weird that there just aren't many smart, talented, hard-working or lucky people across entire continents and thus most people of dozens of nation are poor by virtue of their people largely being just lackluster as humans. 

Odd how by happenchance life is very unfair for a specific set of countries and very fair for another specific. I wonder how such random serendipity could occur in what is a completely random economic system?

[Bloo]

5 minutes ago, Kassi said:

A bulk of which is a result of government backed subsidies. Do you now see the dangers in government picking winners and losers? 

 

That loser should have crumbled under the weight of his own stupidity.

This problem literally wouldn't exist under a communist system because the means of production would not be privately owned. So, I don't get the connection here? This is more of a criticism of our current capitalist system. Corporate handouts literally would not exist in communism.

[Kassi]

4 minutes ago, Communion said:

 

Odd how by happenchance life is very unfair for a specific set of countries and very fair for another specific. I wonder how such random serendipity could occur in what is a completely random economic system?

Two words: Industrial Revolution

 

It historically helped the UK. You mentioned how it helped the USSR. And we can also see how it recently helped China. The US just got there much quicker AND didn't have to rebuild from ruins after two catastrophic World Wars. It's not some conspiracy. 

[Communion]

5 minutes ago, Kassi said:

Two words: Industrial Revolution

 

It historically helped the UK. You mentioned how it helped the USSR. And we can also see how it recently helped China. The US just got there much quicker AND didn't have to rebuild from ruins after two catastrophic World Wars. It's not some conspiracy. 

So you mean all the wealth the US has is produced by labor that occurs within the US? 

[Kassi]

24 minutes ago, Bloo said:

This problem literally wouldn't exist under a communist system because the means of production would not be privately owned. So, I don't get the connection here? This is more of a criticism of our current capitalist system. Corporate handouts literally would not exist in communism.

To own something is to control it, this cannot be done on a collective level because someone(s) must be appointed to control the means, and hence, exercise the power of ownership.

 

Communism simply replaces currency and property, with power over others, and subjects us to the same exact inequality distribution curve. The power concentrates in the hands of the very few who are clever in managing it for their benefit, and those on the other end who end up with nothing, do not even get to keep their lives in some instances.

 

Like... this has literally happened... in real time... in every communist society. It's the natural outcome for any society where the public sector takes excessive power. Where you don't have the monopolists in business (which can be moderated by government), you have the monopoly of the bureaucrats (who are the government). And the second one is actually the one that causes the largest inequality.

[Kassi]

12 minutes ago, Communion said:

So you mean all the wealth the US has is produced by labor that occurs within the US? 

Up until the 1980s, yes. Then we decided to outsource prosperity to formerly communist hellholes like China. Which is now a vibrant, budding superpower that you're able to use as a reference for a successful communist country (while we all secretly pretend like it's not an autocratic capitalist society).

 

You should be happy. 

[Trent W]

2 hours ago, AMIT said:

Sis, it is painfully obvious from your post earlier in the thread that you have not actually gone out of your way to get educated on what communism actually is outside of whatever propaganda you've been fed with during your life. 

 

There is a lot of poverty, misery, violence and death under capitalism and contrary to popular beliefs, those are features of the system, not a bug. You can't reform your way out of them because they are integral to how the system works. 

 

If you're not willing to at least question what you've learned so far about these topics then having a discussion with you about them will inevitably be pointless. 

I’ve kept my mind open, I used to think capitalism was ideal but it’s really not. 

 

It’s still far better than communism tho.

 

You should listen to the members in here that have lived under communism or have relatives that have done so.

 

There are already several posts in this thread.

 

[Cain]

17 hours ago, Delirious said:

What are they then? Democratic?

You are so ******* stupid omg, and so loud too

 

This is why the world is going to ****, the dumbest people think they know best

[Kassi]

I’ll just close by saying that:

• Capitalism = freedom
• Communism = control

Yes, sometimes freedom can get out of hand, and needs to be reigned in by a referee to avoid trampling on the rights/basic humanity of others. 
 

But, under the controlled society of communism, all rights are based on collective identity, and all protections of the individual are eliminated. There are no natural rights under collectivist ideologies and all rights originate and end with social government. 

 

Think: would you really want Rashida Tlaib or Ted Cruz telling you how you can live your life to fit their idea of a fair and equal society?

[Happylittlepunk]

Communism doesn’t work. Cubans can vouche for that easily. It’s absolutely terrible place to live. For people in here defending communism when has it ever worked? It didn’t work for the Soviet Union and it’s not working for China. China is in fact not even communist they are state capitalist countries. Where in 2023 has communism ever worked? And if they working then why aren’t all communist moving over there? Since apparently is better than living in the US or Europe. 

[Communion]

13 minutes ago, Kassi said:

Up until the 1980s, yes. Then we decided to outsource prosperity to formerly communist hellholes like China. Which is now a vibrant, budding superpower that you're able to use as a reference for a successful communist country (while we all secretly pretend like it's not an autocratic capitalist society).

 

You should be happy. 

You seem very angry over being unable to answer very simple questions. This is what I similarly pointed out in the other user employed by NED's posts. 

 

If you believe capitalism is the most efficient solution, being asked to answer to its inherent contradictions shouldn't make you as upset or unable to truthfully answer a question as it routinely makes you and others. 

 

Western capital accumulation is rooted in wealth extraction from other nations, including the extraction of literal "human" capital. 

 

Capitalism requires inequality to function. Slavery and Jim Crow made capitalism "work" within the US and racialized economic inequality was the intended end goal. Global domination by Western powers for wealth extraction makes capitalism "work" across the globe. 

 

The abstraction of capital is not arbitrary and randomized. It is not just that what has value has magically aligned with a specific set of world powers who shape the world in its image. This is a lie you have to tell yourself to pretend as though the inequality your worldview produces is justified, let alone naturalistic, and.thus unchangeable. 

[AMIT]

41 minutes ago, Kassi said:

Communism simply replaces currency and property, with power over others

Private property and capital are what GIVE the capitalist class control over other people 

 

this person is NOT serious, aren't you tired of spilling so much nonsense for FREE? unless someone is paying you to spread propaganda which would be totally believable in that case 

[Trent W]

2 minutes ago, AMIT said:

Private property and capital are what GIVE the capitalist class control over other people 

 

this person is NOT serious, aren't you tired of spilling so much nonsense for FREE? unless someone is paying you to spread propaganda which would be totally believable in that case 

If you are so worried about a small group of people controlling society why the **** do you support communism?

 

Communism is basically that in the most extreme and inhumane form.

 

I’m convinced some people online are propaganda bots

 

No one in their right mind wants to be under such system

[AMIT]

1 minute ago, Trent W said:

If you are so worried about a small group of people controlling society why the **** do you support communism?

 

Communism is basically that in the most extreme and inhumane form.

 

I’m convinced some people online are propaganda bots

 

No one in their right mind wants to be under such system

Sis, again: you don't know what communism is. period. I will not continue to engage with you if you are not willing to be open to unlearn a lot of things you have learned so far. 

 

Do you think the US government wants you to know what communism really is? Do you know what was the Red Scare/McCarthyism? Do you know the first thing about what is and how a hierarchical power structure works? I mean ffs

 

Quote

If you are so worried about a small group of people controlling society why the **** do you support communism?

What do you think the capitalist class entails? 

[Bloo]

7 minutes ago, Trent W said:

If you are so worried about a small group of people controlling society why the **** do you support communism?

 

Communism is basically that in the most extreme and inhumane form.

 

I’m convinced some people online are propaganda bots

 

No one in their right mind wants to be under such system

I don't identify as a communist. But, much of your rhetoric (and others rhetoric) is basically reducing all of communism to a select few countries that identify themselves as communist states, which is an oxymoron to many communists because a truly communist society would be stateless. 

 

If you want to engage in a real discussion about communism vs. capitalism, then you shouldn't contextualize the ideology espoused by communists to just be mouthpieces for the USSR, the CCP, etc. The fact China has the second most number of billionaires of any country is pretty damning if you want to claim it's some bastion of communism in practice.

 

Simple passages from Wikipedia make it clear that many of these "Communist states" do not adhere to what many communist thinkers and scholars describe:

Quote

These states commonly describe themselves as socialist states since they do not claim to have achieved communism, as it would constitute an oxymoron—communist society is anticipated to be stateless. Scholar Jozef Wilczynski notes: "Contrary to Western usage, these countries describe themselves as 'Socialist' (not 'Communist'). The second stage (Marx's 'higher phase'), or 'Communism', is to be marked by an age of plenty, distribution according to needs (not work), the absence of money and the market mechanism, the disappearance of the last vestiges of capitalism and the ultimate 'whithering away' of the State."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_state

[Kassi]

26 minutes ago, AMIT said:

Private property and capital are what GIVE the capitalist class control over other people 

 

this person is NOT serious, aren't you tired of spilling so much nonsense for FREE? unless someone is paying you to spread propaganda which would be totally believable in that case 

Private property and capital actually defuse power across the population. Because they’re spread across a broad spectrum of individuals and entities. 

 

This decentralization means no single entity (like a government in communism) has complete control over the economy. Examples include: small business owners, independent farmers, or freelance workers, who all have control over their means of production and businesses.

 

Then, consumers have the power to influence the market through their purchasing choices (e.g. Netflix beating Blockbuster).

 

Capitalism decentralizes power as much as humanly possible. 

 

Meanwhile, in every communist government, the distribution of power is always shifted from the hands of the population, into the hands of the very few. There’s literally no way around this fact. Central planning means… central planning.

[Communion]

1 minute ago, Trent W said:

If you are so worried about a small group of people controlling society why the **** do you support communism?

 

Communism is basically that in the most extreme and inhumane form.

I think people who have negative feelings over the Soviet Union (while acknowledging that many people who lived during the USSR actually have positive feelings for it vs what followed), especially young people who experienced mostly its collapse are indeed valid in their feelings.

 

But then such of an acknowledgement often demands similarly engaging in the reality that a clear majority of people in places like China for example enjoy the command economy and system of socialism with Chinse characteristics that Mao then Deng built for China versus the kind of humiliation of poverty that came with peasantry. 

 

You can't make the argument that there's an understood social contract that justifies the pitfalls of capitalism because of past societal traumas while ignoring then that the vast majority of the Chinese state accepts their social contract in exchange for the kind of poverty allevatiion that Chinese socialism has brought about. That the goal of poverty elimination is worth sacrificing specific things other countries would view as freedoms. Or are you one of the people who believe a nation of over a billion are all magically mind controlled?

[AMIT]

4 minutes ago, Kassi said:

Capitalism decentralizes power as much as humanly possible. 

Who decides what is or isn't ''humanly'' possible? You? What does that even mean anyway? 

 

 

https://eatamericano.com/blogs/thoughts-from-the-peanut-gallery/the-food-industry-a-game-of-monopoly

 

 

  

 

https://mronline.org/2018/04/12/who-will-take-on-the-21st-century-tech-and-media-monopolies/

 

Quote

Private property and capital actually defuse power across the population. Because they’re spread across a broad spectrum of individuals and entities.

You mean among the capitalists and their corporations? Yeah, I agree. But unfortunately for you that's not what ''population'' means. Being working class means you don't own private property or significant capital. This is the basics, sis! 

 

Quote

Then, consumers have the power to influence the market through their purchasing choices (e.g. Netflix beating Blockbuster).

Consumers have their hand in propagating and reinforcing the system, but the root of the issue is located at the production level, not the consumer one. Also rich people are the ones who consume the most by far. They're also the ones that generally have control of the production means so not sure where you're going with this.

[Kassi]

54 minutes ago, Communion said:

You seem very angry over being unable to answer very simple questions. This is what I similarly pointed out in the other user employed by NED's posts. 

 

If you believe capitalism is the most efficient solution, being asked to answer to its inherent contradictions shouldn't make you as upset or unable to truthfully answer a question as it routinely makes you and others. 

 

Western capital accumulation is rooted in wealth extraction from other nations, including the extraction of literal "human" capital. 

 

Capitalism requires inequality to function. Slavery and Jim Crow made capitalism "work" within the US and racialized economic inequality was the intended end goal. Global domination by Western powers for wealth extraction makes capitalism "work" across the globe. 

 

The abstraction of capital is not arbitrary and randomized. It is not just that what has value has magically aligned with a specific set of world powers who shape the world in its image. This is a lie you have to tell yourself to pretend as though the inequality your worldview produces is justified, let alone naturalistic, and.thus unchangeable. 

There’s nothing to be angry about. You view the world as a zero sum game, where one person inherently loses when another one wins. 
 

Capitalism has proved this to be patently untrue. And has introduced a positive sum game, where rising tides lift all boats.

 

That fundamental outlook is why we can never let people with your mentality win. By adopting the commie mindset, we’re forced to then behave in a negative sum way, and will end up at zero — as has invariably been the case with attempted communist societies. If we believe in a positive sum game, we will trigger a combinatorial explosion of wealth and end up with abundance.
 

[Kassi]

15 minutes ago, AMIT said:

Who decides what is or isn't ''humanly'' possible? You? What does that even mean anyway? 

 

 

https://eatamericano.com/blogs/thoughts-from-the-peanut-gallery/the-food-industry-a-game-of-monopoly

 

 

  

 

https://mronline.org/2018/04/12/who-will-take-on-the-21st-century-tech-and-media-monopolies/

 

You mean among the capitalists and their corporations? Yeah, I agree. But unfortunately for you that's not what ''population'' means. Being working class means you don't own private property or significant capital. This is the basics, sis! 

 

Consumers have their hand in propagating and reinforcing the system, but the root of the issue is located at the production level, not the consumer one. Also rich people are the ones who consume the most by far. They're also the ones that generally have control of the production means so not sure where you're going with this.

The success of capitalism doesn’t preclude the existence of cronyism or general corruption. We’re talking about the underlying principles that govern each system. And, from practical real-world results, we can surmise that capitalism can be improved upon but, unlike communism, doesn’t need to be absolutely PERFECT to work. 
 

There’s a reason people have risked their lives trying to escape communist, socialist, and fascist regimes — all of which are collectivist ideologies based on the same principles of collectivism and social ideological enforcement — to flee to capitalist democracies and representative republics.

[AMIT]

Capitalists: "You will own NOTHING and be happy about it!"

 

ATRL member Kassi: "Now that I think about it, Communism is like a zero sum game!"