Biff wrote:Typical shill who knows nothing of Marxism. "Learn economics and you'll see the error in your ways."
How much economics have you bothered to learn about? I'm willing to bet I've read a lot more Marx and a lot more about modern Marxists (notably Cohen) than you have read about economics beyond the introductory stuff.
So because it has some collectivism, it's communist? Sure thing buddy. You obviously know SQUAT about Marxism.
Does your argument essentially boil down to "well, it wasn't true communism so it doesn't count"? Nice; it's a form of the "no true Scotsman" fallacy. But go on!
The state controlled production and industry. Who controlled the state? Not the workers. You must have workers in control of production and industry in order to have communism. You obviously do not understand this.
Taken from the above link:
"In Russia the state owns the means of production, but who owns the state? Certainly not the workers! The Russian state was intended, by those Marxists who made the revolution in 1917, to be a union of soviets, or workers’ councils, in which delegates were elected from the workplace. Today all efforts to start any independent workers’ initiatives, let alone workers’ councils, are suppressed and rewarded with extreme forms of repression. As Kirov, Stalin’s henchman, accurately prophesied: “We shall be pitiless [to] those lacking in firmness in the factory and the villages and who fail to carry out the plan.”"
This is akin to me saying that America is not a capitalist society because we have things in place that prevent us from having an anarcho-capitalistic society. The fact that it doesn't exhibit communism to the letter does not mean it isn't communism.
And here you go on shoving off your "human nature" arguments. Damn near every anthropologist, sociologist, psychologist will tell you that it's the society that determines behavior and values, it's not something ingrained in us. This idea that people need monetary incentive in order to get off their lazy ass and do anything is what is ridiculous. It's a bankrupt argument.
Wait, you claim I don't understand Marxism, and you go and say "people need monetary incentive"? I'm not letting you get away with that. Incentive definitely does not have to be monetary in economics, just as cost definitely does not have to be monetary, either. I would say, though, that, empirically, monetary incentive motivates in general time and time again. The examples of successful collectivist societies are almost always small units (I would argue that the family is a successful anarcho-communist unit, and that small Christian groups, like the Mennonites, have similarly found success, though they keep group size small by splitting whenever they reach something like 120 members.)
You wouldn't have people volunteering at soup kitchens, goodwill and the humane society if this were the case. Give people access to the necessities of life, get rid of the life sucking bourgeois class and you'll see vast changes in the society itself. It's no small wonder why countries like Sweden and Norway, where they are far more social, have lower crime rates and a happier population, despite the absolutely crap weather.
First, you use Sweden and Norway as your examples, which is telling because they are largely homogeneous populations. But, to entertain your notion, are you really going to claim Sweden and Norway as examples? You just spent multiple posts arguing that, "the USSR wasn't communist!" and then you go cite Sweden and Norway, which are far less so, and use that as evidence? That doesn't seem fair.
You also say, "give people access to the necessities of life." What are these necessities? Further, "give" implies that they come from nowhere. The resources that provide them have to be taken, by force, from people to achieve your goal. I'm fine with you doing whatever you want as long as you incur the cost; volunteer in soup kitchens, help provide people with healthcare, etc. But you saying "give people the necessities" while you use force to take from other people to achieve your goal removes all moral force from the act.
And sure, I'm well aware the sweatshops are a much better alternative to working in the fields. And I'm not arguing that repression isn't a viable way to build wealth either. It quite obviously is. What it comes down to is compassion. If you're cool with people slaving 90 hours a week in brutal conditions barely making ends meat while some lucky sob who was born into wealth is raking in the dough off the fruits of someones labor, then that's fine, we'll call you a inhumane morally bankrupt person and call it a day. I'm not comfortable with that. I want to see a world free of poverty. I want every kid to have the same opportunity as the next. That is NEVER going to be possible with capitalism. Whatever kids father who has accumulated more wealth is going to have a better life and more opportunity. It's just how the system works. Capitalism is very hierarchical and always will be.
I'm cool with people doing whatever they want as long as they aren't forced to do so. People freely choose to work in sweatshops because the alternatives suck. It is unfortunate that those alternatives suck, but how do you expect to improve them? Living wages? Living wages lead to no wages; wages (once again, if you studied anything about economics) are tied to a worker's productivity. Workers in third world countries simply aren't as productive as those working in America and the like. Do you know how they get there? BY GOING THROUGH THAT ROUGH PROCESS TO START. It is telling that you failed to respond to my Japan example of a country going through that sweatshop process and becoming the country with the second largest economy on the planet. I could cite South Korea as another example, in addition to Indonesia (which I already mentioned and got from Krugman, lolz).
And then we have to look at sustainability. Continual economic growth simply is not possible on a planet with finite resources.
lol, you're not real. Continual economic growth is certainly possible as people find more efficient ways to do more with less. In addition, capitalism operates on mutually beneficial trade; simply because resources are finite does not mean that products cannot continue to be traded, with both parties engaging in the trade making themselves better off. The fact that resources are finite does not mean we cannot continue to grow economically, and AGAIN you showcase your lack of economic knowledge.
Let's assume you're right, though. We've heard that swan song for hundreds of years. You know what happens? People find new ways. Aluminum is one of (might be the) most abundant elements in the Earth. It used to be worthless. Now we make all kinds of stuff with it. Further, we can continue to recycle the things we no longer use. God forbid we have enough faith in the innovative capacity of mankind to think we'll keep finding a way.
I want to focus on this section, because I think it's telling of an underlying sentiment to your beliefs:
I want every kid to have the same opportunity as the next. That is NEVER going to be possible with capitalism. Whatever kids father who has accumulated more wealth is going to have a better life and more opportunity. It's just how the system works. Capitalism is very hierarchical and always will be.
You rate equality very highly on the value scale. Personally, I am more concerned with making better off. I'll take unequal wealth distribution if it means that people, as a whole, are better off.
And that's a crucial element of where collectivists, in general, fail. They see wealth as a zero-sum game, where there is a pie of all the value in the world and they want to divide it up equally. But wealth isn't a zero-sum game; it's a game, as I mentioned before, where people make mutually beneficial transactions so that both parties are made better off. To take the "pie" analogy further, that pie grows. While some people may still take a larger portion of the pie, the amount of total value that others receive is greater than if they had divided up that first pie equally.
I want people to be better off and to have better lives. You want people to be equal. I think the first is a far more noble goal than the second.
Tangentially related: Harrison Bergeron! http://instruct.westvalley.edu/lafave/hb.html
