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What is Socialism?

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  • #76
    Originally posted by Sparko View Post
    They aren't the ones trying to control everyone's lives and money. The socialists are.
    It's hilarious that you actually believe that.
    "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
    "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
    "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

    Comment


    • #77
      Originally posted by Starlight View Post
      It's hilarious that you actually believe that.
      Where do socialists get money, Star?
      The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

      Comment


      • #78
        Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
        Where do socialists get money, Star?
        Where does anyone get money CP?

        The issue of where money comes from is actually really, really, complex, and controversial even among modern economists (e.g. see Modern Monetary Theory) - is it a creation of the government, or of the banks, or some sort of more nebulous social construct? Jesus said "render unto Caesar what is Caesar's" (as usual, Republicans take the exact opposite view to Jesus) making the point that the currency bore Caesar's face on it as it had been issued by Caesar's government. And while most nations today issue their own currency in a similar manner, things like the globalization of economics, the financialization of economics, and electronic accounts that correspond to no physical currency, make the study of the creation and distribution of money much more complex.

        As to Sparko's point, it is pretty obvious that in the modern US it is the Republican party that is trying to control people's lives by enforcing their dubious morality on others - e.g. banning people from doing things they disapprove of, like getting an abortion or getting a same-sex marriage.
        "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
        "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
        "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

        Comment


        • #79
          CP, I was thinking about an analogy today that might be helpful, and you can steal it for a sermon if you like...

          Imagine a pioneer settling in an uninhabited land. He works diligently and is able to build for himself a house, create a farm, etc. And he says to himself "nobody gave me anything, I have earned what I have through my hard work", and praised himself for his independence and self-reliance.

          One day he encounters a missionary and hears that really, everything he has, exists because God created it. This is upsetting to the man because it undermines his view that everything he has is due to his own toil.

          He decides he wants to calculate how much of what he has is really rightly "his" - due to his own efforts and labor - and how much of what he has is really "God's". He wants to work out exactly how much of his wealth he can truly call his own.

          What is the true and correct answer? Is there one? My view is that there is no 'right' answer to this question. It is subjective: You could approach it from quite a number of different perspectives and thus get some very different answers. You could say "well without God's creation the man would have nothing at all, so it is all God's" or you could say "well, in one place in the bible the arbitrary figure of 10% as a tithe is suggested (or, in another place first-fruits), so God has declared that to be the correct figure and his declaration makes it so" or you could say that "God might have created the landscape but God wasn't using the landscape and insofar as the man applied his own labor to that landscape and produced things with that labor the entirety of the value created by the labor belongs to him". All of those seem reasonably plausible arguments, and there's not really any proof we can provide that one is the 'right' answer, and yet they correspond to three completely different values - 0%, 10%, 100%.


          Now put aside the theological questions for a moment and consider that in modern society nobody is actually a pioneer living alone in an uninhabited land, and instead people make money via interacting with one another - doing business, being employed etc. In the operation of a business 3 things typically occur:
          1. Society / the govt has set up the rules in such a way that businesses can operate. Money has been created to trade with, laws have been created and enforced to stop your business being robbed daily, contracts exist so you can set out how your business interacts with others, the govt has built roads which allow people to access your place of business, social rules govern how your customers will interact with you etc.
          2. The owner of the business sets up premises for the business to exist, buys the tools for the workers to use, buys the raw materials for the workers, etc.
          3. The workers, using the raw materials and tools provided, perform their labor, thus providing services for the customers or creating an end-product for sale.

          If like the pioneer, the business owner wants to truly know the answer to the question of what part of his riches are truly and accurately owed to him for doing #2 as opposed to society/govt for doing #1 or his workers for doing #3... it turns out this is not an answerable question. Like the pioneer thinking about what parts of his work rightly belong to God there is no objective way of determining it and different subjective lines of reasoning give different answers.

          Over the 20th century there was a lot of change in terms of how much of the income to businesses ended up getting distributed to 1 vs 2 vs 3. Those changes are interesting, but there is no particular distribution that is definitely "the" correct distribution. Like God once declaring that what was owed him was to be 10%, governments have been in a position to arbitrarily declare what is to be owed to them, and this has been very different for different people and at different times. Likewise, the rate of return for capital (#2) versus the rate of return for labor (#3) has varied markedly across the 20th century in the West. There is no such thing as a singular correct distribution of the income among the three contributors to it. Though what we can definitely do is look at the various different societies that have existed with different distributions, and decide on a distribution based on what we would like our own society to look like.
          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

          Comment


          • #80
            Originally posted by Starlight View Post
            CP, I was thinking about an analogy today that might be helpful, and you can steal it for a sermon if you like...

            Imagine a pioneer settling in an uninhabited land. He works diligently and is able to build for himself a house, create a farm, etc. And he says to himself "nobody gave me anything, I have earned what I have through my hard work", and praised himself for his independence and self-reliance.

            One day he encounters a missionary and hears that really, everything he has, exists because God created it. This is upsetting to the man because it undermines his view that everything he has is due to his own toil.

            He decides he wants to calculate how much of what he has is really rightly "his" - due to his own efforts and labor - and how much of what he has is really "God's". He wants to work out exactly how much of his wealth he can truly call his own.

            What is the true and correct answer? Is there one? My view is that there is no 'right' answer to this question. It is subjective: You could approach it from quite a number of different perspectives and thus get some very different answers. You could say "well without God's creation the man would have nothing at all, so it is all God's" or you could say "well, in one place in the bible the arbitrary figure of 10% as a tithe is suggested (or, in another place first-fruits), so God has declared that to be the correct figure and his declaration makes it so" or you could say that "God might have created the landscape but God wasn't using the landscape and insofar as the man applied his own labor to that landscape and produced things with that labor the entirety of the value created by the labor belongs to him". All of those seem reasonably plausible arguments, and there's not really any proof we can provide that one is the 'right' answer, and yet they correspond to three completely different values - 0%, 10%, 100%.


            Now put aside the theological questions for a moment and consider that in modern society nobody is actually a pioneer living alone in an uninhabited land, and instead people make money via interacting with one another - doing business, being employed etc. In the operation of a business 3 things typically occur:
            1. Society / the govt has set up the rules in such a way that businesses can operate. Money has been created to trade with, laws have been created and enforced to stop your business being robbed daily, contracts exist so you can set out how your business interacts with others, the govt has built roads which allow people to access your place of business, social rules govern how your customers will interact with you etc.
            2. The owner of the business sets up premises for the business to exist, buys the tools for the workers to use, buys the raw materials for the workers, etc.
            3. The workers, using the raw materials and tools provided, perform their labor, thus providing services for the customers or creating an end-product for sale.

            If like the pioneer, the business owner wants to truly know the answer to the question of what part of his riches are truly and accurately owed to him for doing #2 as opposed to society/govt for doing #1 or his workers for doing #3... it turns out this is not an answerable question. Like the pioneer thinking about what parts of his work rightly belong to God there is no objective way of determining it and different subjective lines of reasoning give different answers.

            Over the 20th century there was a lot of change in terms of how much of the income to businesses ended up getting distributed to 1 vs 2 vs 3. Those changes are interesting, but there is no particular distribution that is definitely "the" correct distribution. Like God once declaring that what was owed him was to be 10%, governments have been in a position to arbitrarily declare what is to be owed to them, and this has been very different for different people and at different times. Likewise, the rate of return for capital (#2) versus the rate of return for labor (#3) has varied markedly across the 20th century in the West. There is no such thing as a singular correct distribution of the income among the three contributors to it. Though what we can definitely do is look at the various different societies that have existed with different distributions, and decide on a distribution based on what we would like our own society to look like.
            And the answer, for progressives at least, is certainly not that half the worlds wealth should go to 1% of the worlds population, or that half a countries wealth should go to 1% of the countries population. You would think that of all people, Christians like CP could grasp that.

            Comment


            • #81
              Originally posted by Starlight View Post
              It's hilarious that you actually believe that.
              It's built into the whole idea of socialism: The government controls the means of production and doles out jobs and money to the citizens.

              All you have to do is look at every socialist government in the history of the world. The closer they get to the socialist ideal, the more controlling and totalitarian they become.

              But I am sure they all did it wrong and if we just do it the way YOU think it should be done, all will be well and good.

              socialismfork.jpg

              Comment


              • #82
                Originally posted by Sparko View Post
                It's built into the whole idea of socialism: The government controls the means of production and doles out jobs and money to the citizens.
                As I've explained on this forum many a time, there are two major and completely different sub-types of socialism: Communism and Democratic Socialism.

                Your statement is only true of communism, it is false with regard to democratic socialism. Since myself, Bernie, AOC etc are democratic socialists not communists, I don't know why you'd even bother to talk about communism. I think communism was a stupid system and I don't find it either particular interesting nor relevant to anything I believe - it is so, so, different to democratic socialism there isn't much transferable from one to the other.

                All you have to do is look at every socialist government in the history of the world. The closer they get to the socialist ideal, the more controlling and totalitarian they become.
                I would actually say that what happened was that during the cold war when the US was trying to overthrow any government it didn't like the look of (on 72 occasions), that the more democratic countries were more easily subverted by foreign interference (as the US has been finding from Russian interference). So by the time the US was done trying to destabilize democracies, only the more totalitarian regimes were left. Most of the socialist countries that survived US attack were thus the more totalitarian ones.

                Nicaragua is perhaps an exception, as the democratic socialist government there survived despite the US openly sponsoring a terror regime against it.

                But I am sure they all did it wrong and if we just do it the way YOU think it should be done, all will be well and good.
                Well, like you I think they (the communist countries) did it wrong, and like you I think it should be done a different way to what they did. So I point to the most successful countries in the present day like the Scandinavian countries and suggest they make a good model to follow.
                "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                Comment


                • #83
                  Originally posted by JimL View Post
                  And the answer, for progressives at least, is certainly not that half the worlds wealth should go to 1% of the worlds population, or that half a countries wealth should go to 1% of the countries population. You would think that of all people, Christians like CP could grasp that.
                  You need your diaper changed again, Jimmy.
                  The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                  Comment


                  • #84
                    Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                    Where does anyone get money CP?
                    Some of us actually earn it, Starlight. I know that's a really foreign concept. But some of us earn money, manage it well, pay our taxes, and on TOP of that, give cheerfully to others in need. Please let me know what I'm doing wrong.
                    The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                    Comment


                    • #85
                      Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                      As I've explained on this forum many a time, there are two major and completely different sub-types of socialism: Communism and Democratic Socialism.

                      Your statement is only true of communism, it is false with regard to democratic socialism.
                      It isn't necessarily true of communism either:
                      In political and social sciences, communism is the philosophical, social, political, and economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of the communist society, which is a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money and the state.
                      Jorge: Functional Complex Information is INFORMATION that is complex and functional.

                      MM: First of all, the Bible is a fixed document.
                      MM on covid-19: We're talking about an illness with a better than 99.9% rate of survival.

                      seer: I believe that so called 'compassion' [for starving Palestinian kids] maybe a cover for anti Semitism, ...

                      Comment


                      • #86
                        Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
                        Some of us actually earn it, Starlight. I know that's a really foreign concept. But some of us earn money, manage it well, pay our taxes, and on TOP of that, give cheerfully to others in need. Please let me know what I'm doing wrong.
                        Looters and those who exhibit their "generosity" by giving away what others have earned will never be able to grasp it.

                        I'm always still in trouble again

                        "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
                        "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
                        "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

                        Comment


                        • #87
                          Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                          [ATTACH=CONFIG]33797[/ATTACH]
                          FIFY. n/c
                          Attached Files

                          Comment


                          • #88
                            Originally posted by Roy View Post
                            It isn't necessarily true of communism either:
                            In political and social sciences, communism is the philosophical, social, political, and economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of the communist society, which is a socioeconomic order structured upon the common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social classes, money and the state.
                            And the "common ownership" is a totalitarian government. Every time.

                            Comment


                            • #89
                              Originally posted by Sparko View Post
                              And the "common ownership" is a totalitarian government. Every time.
                              Not that I agree with common ownership, but tell it to the Apostles. Although I understand that christians have long ago rationalized that biblical teaching away.

                              Comment


                              • #90
                                Originally posted by JimL View Post
                                Not that I agree with common ownership, but tell it to the Apostles. Although I understand that christians have long ago rationalized that biblical teaching away.
                                That wasn't a nation, it was a group of people helping each other out, a family not a government. And nobody was forced to give anything. They shared it. Things they OWNED and EARNED themselves. Charity is not communism.

                                Comment

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