Is communism GOOD?

reply to post by SaturnFX


do you actually swallow that "work=reward" crap or are you vomiting it out here because you can't stomach it?

the level of "reward" you achieve in life depends upon your contribution to perpetuating the corrupt and sickening system. if you lie, cheat, steal, swindle, back-stab and oppress those around you, you will succeed, in crime, politics, finance or business.

if on the other hand you enhance your surroundings, educate, nurture or positively contribute to the larger society in any way, you will be demeaned by arses and punished for your "weakness".

at least be honest if you're going to sneer, it's not "work=reward", it's "being a dick=reward".

reply to post by Donnie Darko


I think you really don't understand what communism means.

Communism embraces atheism and dismisses religion as “the opiate of the masses,” a system designed by the rich and powerful to keep the poor in their place.

Communism is death.

Originally posted by SuperSlovak
Communism is death.

religion is the fear of death, communism is just an economic system.

Originally posted by pieman
reply to post by SaturnFX

 

do you actually swallow that "work=reward" crap or are you vomiting it out here because you can't stomach it?

the level of "reward" you achieve in life depends upon your contribution to perpetuating the corrupt and sickening system. if you lie, cheat, steal, swindle, back-stab and oppress those around you, you will succeed, in crime, politics, finance or business.

if on the other hand you enhance your surroundings, educate, nurture or positively contribute to the larger society in any way, you will be demeaned by arses and punished for your "weakness".

at least be honest if you're going to sneer, it's not "work=reward", it's "being a dick=reward".

If that is your worldview, then so be it. to me, that simply sounds like an excuse not to even try.
I am not talking about being a billionare...thats a different game all together, I am talking about normal success or failure. You can shake your fist at TPTB all you want while giving up on trying...I know plenty of small business owners whom are doing just fine because they decided to try verses doubt.

So, you create your worldview of how everything is broken, and voila, you will find everything broken. I however will create my own worldview of how with effort you can become something and continue to have the success I am experiencing :-)

In my opinion, communism in it's purest, most true form, would work wonderfully. However, even if it did get to that point, it'd only be a matter of time before it went down hill...

It's human nature people, and it's unfortunate.

Originally posted by SaturnFX
I however will create my own worldview of how with effort you can become something and continue to have the success I am experiencing :-)

hey man, thats just peachy, i dunno if being delusional will help you keep your business going but if it gets you through the day, who am i to argue.

Communism... looks great on paper.

But in practice it just sucks worse than a 1 dollar toothless whore.

Here's a great insight into communism and why it doesn't work.

An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.

Originally posted by pieman
who am i to argue.

Nobody of consequence. My reality is filled with setbacks, startovers, and successes. The more I put into something, curiously the more success I get from it.

My "delusion" is created by observation of how things work in a practical sense in my life and those around me....What is, in my opinion, a delusion, is to preset success or failure before an attempt is even made due to either negative or positive feelings towards the matter as a whole.

If I look at a bike and say anyone whom gets on it falls, bikes are unridable for more than a 10 second span, then jump on it to prove myself right...guess what...I will more than likely fall within 10 seconds.

I tend to look at the bike and simply think...one can ride that bike if they try. some fall, some dont, but with effort, it can be mastered...
To me, this is the approach of all things, be it riding a bike, starting a business, or living in a socio-capitalist society (again, billionaire tycoons are an anomoly in this system and therefore dont fit into this mindset, but otherwise, on a micro-scale, the system works fine and the "realist" point of view)

Originally posted by grey580
Communism... looks great on paper.

That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A.

Its sad that the professor didn't know how to teach his class. Socialism is not communism...what he attempted to show was communism and a brilliant example based on that actually. However, he tagged the wrong word to it.
Socialism would reward the person based upon how much they contributed to the system...all starting from a base and working up from there.

Both socialism and communism are based on the principle that the goods and services produced in an economy should be owned publicly, and controlled and planned by a centralized organization. Socialism asserts that the distribution should take place according to the amount of individuals' production efforts, however, while communism asserts that that goods and services should be distributed among the populace according to individuals' needs.

Originally posted by serbsta
System 1:

Your grandfather built a home with his bear hands and started a business.

Your father continued to run this business effectively and expanded it into other cities.

In a Capitalist state... you inherit the business and are allowed to continue to expand and make profit.

System 2:

Your grandfather built a home with his bear hands and started a business.

Your father continued to run this business effectively and expanded it into other cities.

In a Communist state... the government takes your business and splits it up. Grand-pappy wouldn't be too happy would he?

Thankfully Communism is a dead and dusted system.

Not saying I agree with unregulated corporatism within a capitalist system, we've all seen how that can turn out.

In a capitalist order, your grandfather builds a home or business on STOLEN land (acquired either through ruse or force) and protected by a military body and a set of laws which protects totally ARBITRARY notions of property and ownership. No matter who previously owned this land (or simply used the land without the need to own it, like in pre-colonial America), any right to use and even access it is now restricted by this legal-militaristic body called "the State", or simply private police when the State's not around. If you think Area 51 and S-4 are restricted areas, just look at the tons of lands barb-wired and defended by cold-blooded gunslingers during the Far West era, and you'll see there's nothing new.

Your grandfather then manages to build capital with this business and home through wage slavery and growing up a family where the mens will be his heirs and womens will serve as support to the heritage and sharing the family capital through a more or less tightly-controlled mating (marriage), which leads to racism and class mentality. This is, at least, the more traditional form of capitalism.

In a communist order, private property (or stealing) is reversed, and land -and goods- is brought back to the hands of the people, by being abolished and redefined a common ownership, or public domain, between the folks who live from it. Your grandmothers don't live in the shadow of your grandfathers, and have about the same access of power and social status. Family and coupling of individuals is open, since there is no need to restrict the ties, as individual property is rendered irrelevant. Education is provided by parents and/or teachers serving the community. "Bureaucracy" is non-existent as well (or thin, at most), since it based on division of labor and the need to control, which emerge from division of property and exploitation of people's labor. Military, if needed by the conditions you're in, is assumed by everyone who is apt and willing to serve, and his ruled by folk councils, who choose or elect warlords (or generals) when needed. Factories are self-managed through labor councils as well. No B.O.D.s, just assemblies of workers discussing on a regular basis the needs related to production and exchange of goods. Look at how the GNU/Linux project has developed through the years, and you'll get a good idea of how communist economy can work effectively without a central bureaucracy or ridiculous property (Digital Rights Management) laws. Just as the GNU movement, modern communism is set to rise out (and against) the very conditions created by the capitalistic system, parasiting it while growing out of it, and eventually replacing it.


[edit on 16/2/10 by Echtelion]

[edit on 16/2/10 by Echtelion]

reply to post by ProUSA


I agree. Communism works very well in theory, but after you add the human element, thats when the failure begins.

Chinas run by communism. Boy, they turned out GOOD didn't they!

The capatalistic system never served the average Joe, wich is obvious.
We are slaves without real freedom. Worrying about money is not freedom, it is punishment.
We have been transformed from people to consumers. From free spirits reduced to money loving wrecks.
The reason for this is the all consuming hunger for money coming from the highest regions in our society, simply
because money equals power.

There is a simple system to free everyone from the clutches of those money hungry wolves.
Simply by removing the money from the pockets and mind of our society we can be really free.
Not the orchestrated "freedom" we know now, but real freedom.
Imagine never having to worry about money ever again, you can worry about the things that are really important
to you.

How?
You keep on doing your job, but you get no money for it. If you need a bread you go and get one from a bakery without paying anything.
This doesn't mean the people at the bakery work for nothing, anything they need they can get from stores without paying.
Everybody keeps doing their jobs and in return they can get wat they want from the shops.
Very simple and very effective.

The quality of products increase, inferiour materials used to make a profit are no longer usefull.
The products can be more enviroment friendly, since money is no longer a factor.
This system can be used on any aspect of society.
Working gives you the right to go out and get whatever you need.
People who cannot work still have the right to get whatever they need, since they get money now we should be able to support them without it.
The goverment will be care-takers in every aspect, they take care of our society, like it was once intended.

Let go of your old ideas and take a step forward in evolution.


That was my rant, i just needed to get it off my chest



Repost

Originally posted by grey580
Communism... looks great on paper.

But in practice it just sucks worse than a 1 dollar toothless whore.

Here's a great insight into communism and why it doesn't work.

An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.

All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.

The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.

So, apparently a large portion of the class that was claiming that socialism would work were not even willing to prove that it COULD work if people tried.

Yeah.. that class was incredibly stupid. I can think of classes of kids of which I was a part that weren't too bright but prideful enough to atleast prove a point.

Of course, because of the human element, there is NO system that "works". Sorry to tell you people who are arguing over whether capitalism or communism or socialism or whatever is better... but you're arguing foolishly.

People have the ability to make better or to ruin ANY system - equally. For those of you attempting to seek a system which would only provide economic equality to all people, the answer is Evil Socialism. I call it EVIL socialism because there is a step that is being left out.

That class had the right idea, but they forget about something... they forgot to check the individual grades and see who the lowest scorers were. Anyone who got under a C should have been kicked out of the class. The incentive to make better grades would then arise. The next test average would have been an A - but the bar should find a permanent resting place at C because all people are human. People shouldn't live to work, but work to live.

So it goes, in real life, if you want the best system for PEOPLE, as we are right now, it is Evil Socialism. If you don't work at a fair pace for a fair amount of time and develop a fair product on a pretty fair basis, then you would be excommunicated to the wild until you bring product to prove your worth.

Of course, this is to live in a society.. some people are better fit for the wild. Ironically... if you sent enough people to the wild, they would learn to work together to survive.

So, in actuality, it's not incredibly evil in the sense that the excommunication would eventually lead to people learning WHY the work must be done.

Everyone wants this beautiful utopia where only good thrives... I believe in God and His will...

But in our current state, people can only do well when faced with an evil program.

Notice how comfortable people get when society is doing well? People become pathetic and even more spoiled. Why do you think that the GAME is CAUSING US TO SUFFER?

Don't worry. Democracy eventually leads to evil socialism and it will come. And you will all see the "rewards" for not expecting rewards for your "hard work" (Yeah, I'm talking to all you HARD-WORKING lawyers and teachers and business people and cube-rats and all of you people who THINK you're working hard but don't have a clue what it is to do so... even if you once had.)

For all you fools complaining about how much "tax" is paid to the government and by whom, remember this : all that CRAP tha you buy all the time with the other half of your humongous paycheck is put together and distributed and presented to you by people who earn NOTHING compared to your 1/2 of your share. You want capitalism... well, you got it. The government capitalizes off of your greedy materialism and so do the bottom rungers. Bravo.

If the federal government hadn't made it illegal to just go find land that they are not using, be it parks or whatever, for you to hunt and grow and play like a real human with other real humans who don't really exist anymore anyhow... then us bottom rungers wouldn't be putting together your materials to feed off your greed so we can collect $250-350 a week to live by (because we're smarter than becoming a college-grad with a humongous debt to pay for an education that is fool's gold only to get a job that makes you either incredibly depressed and oppressed or greedy and slimy) and we live comfortably BELOW OUR MEANS - have little to no credit problems, paid for our used cars with cash, buy our food intelligently, buy our entertainment intelligently, owe nothing to nobody, and pay for our medical issues as they arise because we're not COMPLETELY afraid and/or fooled into believing that paying a butt-load of health/dental/life insurance is going to save ANYTHING - but in reality eat up all the money that you could have used to pay off whatever the problem is... and we're wise enough to know that if something particularly evil arises that we'll have to suffer violently, death is normal, and there is nothing we can do to stop it.

I think my rant is probably not incredibly easy to read, but I hope everyone understands.

All your systems are a joke. Make your own system - live below your means. Make use of whatever system you have. Stop being so STUPID.

And love God.

reply to post by grey580


And what if they had realised that it's not about having good grades but education, enlightment, accomplishment of oneself ? Your exemple shows how materialistic our mindset is. Good grades, fast cars, big houses are trivial goals.
I think true communism wouldn't work but certainly mankind would live better with more cooperation and less cutthroat competition.
We are a social specie like ants. We can't live on our own. We form colonies, have specialised workers. Egotism doesn't make sense, it's not the trait that allowed us to survive.

Well I don't know how many of you here have ever been to Eastern Europe or lived in a Communist or Ex-Communist controlled country, but I have lived in one for almost 6 years now. I live in Moldova which is the poorest most densely populated country in Eastern Europe. The communist system left it physically and its people psychologically almost beyond repair. The same goes for both Ukraine and Russia which I have traveled in extensively. It will take generations for those people to shake off the despair, lack of hope, of self worth, and to realize that they can have real hopes, dreams and aspirations.

Those of you who thing socialism or communism would be just the best thing since sliced bread should see what I have seen. You can write about all the wonderful things you want regarding socialist experimentation and put it all in a big book and then as far as the practical application of it you might as well toss it on the fire. Does not and will not ever work.

A capitalist democratic system is the only system which offers the individual the possibility of achieving their full potential.

So now you will say.. yes but we live in such a system and everything is screwed up. Well it is screwed up because we let it get out of control and failed to keep the correct controls in place to sustain it. IT IS OUR FAULT.
We allowed the unfettered accumulation of wealth by the few and we allowed the lazy and shiftless an easy ride.. one is just as bad as the other.


Now what is wrong?

Our implementation of Capitalism is doomed to fail. Why? Ask your mother and father, your preacher, your teacher, if any of them ever taught you any "stopping sense". Did anyone ever instill into you that you should work hard and earn your place in society and remember from whence you came and know when to say "I have made it..I know in my heart this is enough, its time to stop"? Did anyone ever tell you that the only reason to work is to make enough money so you don't have to?

It is greed that is the culprit, greed for power and wealth. Everyone will say that it is just human nature.. NO it is not.."STOPPING SENSE" can be taught.

In my opinion, its on par with a republic. its more effiecient but less happiness as time marches on the problem is humans and greed usually is the end of communism. it appears, people with power require more from the people than the people themselves -- there for communism is flawed. however, a communistic central planning is what all governments do. where communism is a mandate by the state. Republics is more like a sales job to sway people to accepting things because everyone else is accepting them. "go along to get along".

and the death of a republic is when people realize they can write checks on the treasury and well thats whats going on right now. they are basically going to bankrupt the system. or inflate it... after all we dont have 0000's at the end of our Fiat currency yet... so expect inflation and a zero or two at the end. but who knows -- our economy is 100% under control -- charles lindberg correctly stated it back in the day.

www.youtube.com...

reply to post by expat2368


I figured i would point out that data (plural) is from datum (singular).

You do realize democracy -leads- to socialism and your whole argument is flawed simply because your system, just like every other system, assumes that people would be well. YET, we realize... people can only be convinced to be well for so long as we allow people to profit off of others - which CAPITALISM DOES JUST AS WELL AS SOCIALISM.

It is HUMAN to thrive off of everyone else. This is SOCIETY!

Live in the wild alone... and then you will understand.

Originally posted by Donnie Darko
Was communism itself bad, or was it the fact that all the Marxist states were just scams?

True communism would mean the community takes care of itself, without any government. I think that's how it should be.

Of course the Soviet Union just made that a far-off promise, in practice it was a dictatorship little different from Hitler's Germany, same with China today.

Marxist states are indeed, in laymen's terms, a scam. The Soviet block, as an instance was actually hardcore, Eastern-style, socialism. Socialism is part of the "transitional" approach to political change, towards an idealized form of communism that, according to Marx is a thousand years from its starting point of change. Socialism is actually about changing the system from within without a revolutionary social conflict, by infiltrating the State and using it to enforce, progressively, a vision of communist order (that is obviously defined by the bureaucrats). It is essentially idealistic and despotic, even when going through democratic process (the democratic system anyways is utterly despotic i its own sophisticated way). And the punch line in that big joke, is that it's supposed to be aiming at creating a classless and free society, without the despotism of a central bureaucracy. At the end of the equation, things stay as bad, with a bunch of crooks still holding to power in the name of "the people".

Socialism IS what Orwell warns us in "1984". George Orwell used to be a communist revolutionary soldier, of libertarian leanings, who fought in Spain against the fascist tyranny, and was a witness of the corruption and bloody repression of this movement by both Spanish and Soviet socialists. His comrade Andres Nin, a prominent member of the libertarian communists, was tortured to death by the Stalinists around the end of the war. 1984 was a diatribe against the Fabian socialists of UK, who were threatening to be an arm of the Soviet regime.

I share the same aversion towards socialism than most libertarians in here, since it is essentially a despotic (and fascistic, in a way) form of capitalism, where a bureaucratic elite holds the exclusive right to decide what's good for the remaining 95%-99% of the population, and everybody has to comply with its sacrosanct order under the threat of being prosecuted, or even killed.


[edit on 16/2/10 by Echtelion]

What we would call true communism has existed repeatedly over the ages...almost all of them either in primitive societies or in small monastic communities. Would it work for a large society? Probably not for the same reasons a truly Democratic society doesn't work in large societies...the structure becomes too complex.

A better question would be...is capitalism good and does it work?