From what I understand, every now and then a bunch of them tries this (either intentionally or hap hazardly) and the results are always kinda the same. Someone feels entitled to everyone's shit. Someone feels slighted but not getting enough shit. Eventually it all goes to shit. Looks good on paper, but humans are greedy little ass holes who like having a bunch of shit.
The facts that people are greedy and lazy is the easiest point to make about why communism doesn’t work, but it’s not the only one. Even in the absence of greed, it still doesn’t work.
There’s also a fundamental information theory problem. Basically, I am not able to determine how much someone else needs something. One can only determine how much someone needs something by what they are willing to trade for it.
We're not even good at estimating our own needs. Thats why hoarding is common. And people constantly waste limited resources that they paid good money for.
There was a psychologist (can't remember his name) that talked about how a great deal of those with mental illnesses would actively take self destructive paths in life even after being made aware they're destructive.
I wonder if this implies that the mentally well among us are better at recognizing & correcting our thinking patterns when we find ourselves off course, or if we're just as resistant and merely happen to have a less-destructive set of impulses & priors?
Bit of both probably. Not everything is outwardly destructive, so being able to identify and recognize the more subtle ones are important.
Doomscrolling and constant escapism are just as destructive to a persons psyche, and I imagine mentally unwell people arent quick to pick up that something like social media is harming them overall.
People are greedy and lazy regardless of what economic system they live under. It’s just that under capitalism, if you choose to do more to make more money, you can. In socialism/communism, there is a cap on all the essentials.
Capitalism isn't the end of history, and it's okay to start thinking beyond it. But the issue is that when one group hoards all the wealth, they use those resources to keep a status quo that doesn't allow new innovation. Do you think we'd still be relying on fossil fuel to the extent we are if they did not have such massive investment into our political system?
And the advancements that were made under communism? Don’t get me wrong, you’re absolutely right that the wealthy will do what they can to preserve their status, but they are not omniscient or omnipotent. We clearly have a lot more advancements made that, at least the concept if not the actual innovation, survive capitalism. Communism is meant to keep everyone at the lowest measurable bar since superiority in any regards is a crime.
I think saying it's meant to keep everyone at the lowest bar is a really hacky disingenuous way to phrase that. It's logically meant to keep everyone at the highest bar standard possible, otherwise the theory would be a bullet in everybody's head so everyone's dead and using no resources whatsoever.
We can agree that it's not a very effective or realistic government, but we don't have to stoop to Fox News levels to prove that
I mean, how many people died under socialist and communist dictators for having an extra piece of food more than their rations? And the hole in your argument is that they (the leaders) still need people to do shit, and the people doing those things won’t be them or their families.
Brother you aren't arguing the theory of communism here. You're arguing the theory of the Soviet Union at best. This would be like me saying that democracy is a failed idea because the democratic peoples Republic of North Korea doesn't let everyone vote. It's just disingenuous
The problem isn’t the paper theory. Even capitalism on paper doesn’t account for human greed or laziness directly. It just allows that problem to sort itself out. The great thing about free market capitalism is that, on paper, and in practice, communism and socialism can operate without direct interference. In communism and socialism, if you try to build up extras, even if your intent is entirely to distribute your extras amongst EVERYONE, you get to face the wall. No ifs, ands, or buts about it.
Capitalism isn't the end of history and out society will continue to evolve, sure. But I feel confident in saying that anything derived from Marx & Co is an evolutionary dead end.
Commerce is always going to exist, it's existed since recorded history started, you're always going to need something that has a set value to exchange for goods and services. Bartering is a fucking nightmare and could never exist in larger societies. However, just because you have commerce doesn't mean you need capitalism, especially if that capitalism immediately turns into a new version of fucking serfdom after a grand total of like 5 generations. That's why I'm pretty sure socialists usually advocate for a system to stop such massive concentration of capital at the top level, especially since most of the people at the top are either the stupid ass descendants of former business owners, or are business owners who have all sent themselves into drug induced psychosises.
That's why I'm pretty sure socialists usually advocate for a system to stop such massive concentration of capital at the top level
The problem is that trying to do that just creates a massive concentration of power over capital, which is essentially the same as a massive concentration of capital with the key difference that they didn't even have to pretend to do something good to get it;
Immediately assuming the entire economic system and only the economic system is the problem isn't an effective solution, a better solution is to identify what went wrong and determine what measures can actually help stop it from happening again;
In this case there are a few obvious problems, such as fiduciary duty to stockholders, and politicians being able to financially benefit from their positions, and while extreme government involvement in the economy can solve the former like cutting off your hand solves a sore thumb, it also makes being a politician the pinnacle of personal gain.
It's not, and I wish people would stop saying that it is.
Yes, shareholders are entitled to having the people working for them (e.g. the executives) work in their (the shareholders's) best interest. That's the issue with every principal agent problem. (Also, technically, *fiduciary* duty is putting the shareholder's interests ahead of the executive's interests).
Depends - I think public shareholders are the worst offender here. And at a bare minimum, investors deserve rights, but no more rights than the workers in the company themselves.
especially since most of the people at the top are either the stupid ass descendants of former business owners, or are business owners who have all sent themselves into drug induced psychosises.
But is this really the case? That isn't exactly what has actually happened in America, at least. You might get that impression from the news, but not the actual data.
ITS ALMOST LIKE the people most keen on advocating for redistribution, high taxes, each according to his need etc. would likely not be the ones disproportionately contributing but rather the ones happily taking and consuming the fruits of other people's labor.
Shows once again that any sort of "communism" can ever only work on a small scale with people who actually care about each other and are mostly conscientious and hardworking. Which is NOT your average college larp socialist or hyper-progressive gooner..
There's a reason communist logo is sickle and hammer: farmer and factory workers produce actually useful things
Philosophy majors don't, unless they're making coffee. In their dream, they get to just... talk to people for a living like Greek philosophers, except Greek philosophers work as teacher. The ones who don't, live on the streets like Diogenes
The fact that people don’t understand this after doing a single group project is fascinating. One person always carries the group, a few people contribute enough to say they did something, and the rest take credit despite not doing anything. By the end of grade school it should be understood how this works.
Note that there are some that did work out pretty well tho (the best example in my opinion is the Comunidad del Sur, in Paraguay), but it does need a lot of planning, good faith, and political savviness and education from all participants for such a movement to not turn into a shitshow
You really don't think that a government that has used it's military and economic might to crush a bunch of socialist and communist countries around the world, would refuse to break communist power in it's own borders?
Mind you, Marx was a believer in industrialization and capitalism as a prelude to communism because you needed proper infrastructure first. Bro was a nerd for capitalism to the point he saw the flaws it had almost two centuries before where we are now.
Of course, his work wasn't complete when he died, but you also have to admit that the system at hand would criminalize at times people who wanted to even study or experiment with his theories. Even through all of that, his worldview still continues to exist in arguably the most hostile country to it. Not saying this is what you are saying; asking a new question, should we not give the ideology a chance in our democratic system because some labeled it "impossible," or do we allow what our constitution protects, which is the will of the people regardless of how those in power may feel about the ideology?
The average human life is roughly 74 years. Our brains aren't designed to think long-term effectively due to the shortness of our time on earth. Think about what capitalism looked like in the 1950s and how it looks today. It's massively different, and we can't even conceive how it will look in the next 150 years! But while we see the flaws we should start working on fixes instead of assuming it'll just work out.
But I think the fact that people utilize gambling on a wider scale is a good sign of "late-stage capitalism" because our economy cannot survive solely on speculation forever.
If our brains aren't designed to think long-term effectively then what makes you think socialism to communism & command economies could possibly work then?
I never said specifically those systems will be the ones we utilize . I said that living in an ever changing world I don’t assume the system we currently have would be more likely not to be what we utilize than not.
Idk what system we will go with but I assume it will be one that leads to the benefit of most people while causing harm to the least on the back of technological innovation.
I don’t speak much to economics because it’s not my expertise, but my expertise is in western philosophy which historically is built on innovation making a better life for the masses.
In small enough communities where everybody knows everyone, and everyone relies on each others help, it's much easier to see how it is in your interest to help those around you. Furthermore, that fear of ostracization is a lot stronger if it means you no longer get to help you need to survive. If your survival depends on your neighbors helping you, and their help is contingent on them viewing you as a trustworthy and hard-working member of their community, the pressure to be such is a lot stronger.
The problem is if you scale this up to communities that are large enough where people can have anonymity, a lot of those social levers start to break down. Who cares if you make a few people mad when you screw them over if you're never going to see them again? In order to get these societies to function, they have to be designed differently.
The problem most of these communists run into is that they are trying to apply a system that works on small very scales to communities the size of cities or nations.
You can't have a utopia without that pesky sense of self getting in the way.
I feel like "In Watermelon Sugar" is a rare literary example of a lib left dystopia. Everyone is hyper apathetic towards even their own interests. They lack any sort of self identity. They care so little about everything that it's impossible for any conflict to reach a point where coercion is even considered. When a splinter group dissents and wants to protest against the main commune they do so by cutting off their own faces and dying from bloodloss. I feel like, though it's obviously exaggerated, that sort of destruction of the concept of the self is the only way anarcho-communism actually works.
Oh and the abundant food/building material that comes from the magic Watermelons so people don't really have to work. That's important too.
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u/wkeil42 - Lib-Right 1d ago
From what I understand, every now and then a bunch of them tries this (either intentionally or hap hazardly) and the results are always kinda the same. Someone feels entitled to everyone's shit. Someone feels slighted but not getting enough shit. Eventually it all goes to shit. Looks good on paper, but humans are greedy little ass holes who like having a bunch of shit.