As a queer person (agender) with a conservative dad, I don’t get why he says he wants to go back to the 1950s. What was so special back then besides his reasoning that times were simpler? I feel like it would be harder for me then as a queer person.
As a queer person (agender) with a conservative dad, I don’t get why he says he wants to go back to the 1950s. What was so special back then besides his reasoning that times were simpler? I feel like it would be harder for me then as a queer person.
Oh I know what you meant, exactly. It’s grade school history. It’s also the same take repeated endlessly on internet forums where pedantry and needing to spell out every single facet rule supreme. So I guess I’ll spell it out. “The economy refers to the fact someone was able to pay for a home, family, and yearly vacation on an entry level, high school diploma as the only requirement job. The civil rights and liberties people are stating as the one thing they didn’t want to bring to modern times.”
I’m going to assume you know why someone would want that without the abuse of minorities, immigrants, or third world countries.
Or you can just pull the same thing everyone else does and state, “A society like that couldn’t exist without that exploitation.” like the true unique free thinker you are. To which I say prove it. We’ve always had a rich parasite class that needed exploitation, those who are fine without being far wealthier than others are perfectly capable of doing fine without the exploitation, its the leeches that require it.
that you appear not to know. which is easy for you because you were not on the receiving end of the violence.
you are arguing with a strawman. thats not what us capitalism did in the 50s.
Ah it’s always the same with those ideologically blinded people.
Capitalism is inherently bad blah blah
Socialism can never work blah blah
It’s all bullshit. Capitalism does not matter, socialism does not matter. How we call it does not matter. What matters is that a society is healthy, sustainable and prospering.
The main problem of all theories is the confrontation with reality - each set of values or ideology is as much worth as the people who (supposedly) follow it.
In any system we ever built, there are greedy, corrupt, powerful people, who like shit, always somehow end up swimming at the top. And then everything begins to rot.
This is just you replacing sound economic analysis with vibes-based idealism, ironically you’re divorcing yourself from reality while claiming others need to see it better. A quick example is that socialism has resulted in far lower inequality while maintaining stable growth than capitalism has, yet you pretend they are the same in disparity. Connect with reality.
heres the actual material reality: western capitalists control the world, they are fucking us over. it was only ever “prosperous” to a select few countries.
socialism is historically one of the only ways to defeat it, i get the people who like it.
Socialism was never implemented in good faith. Oh, you’re talking about the Soviet Union? Try to run a planned economy on a scale of a modern society. And tell me about equality and freedom where you gotta be in the party to have access to better stuff.
Or you are talking about China? Well, they are pragmatic and apparently learned. That’s why China is not a planned economy, but state capitalism. Sadly, it’s heavily authoritarian.
Capitalism and the idea of markets is not the problem. The problem is if it becomes an end in itself. So if you ask me, economically, the model that China is doing right now is right and obviously pretty successful. It is the rest I would rather not copy.
I neither want to live in a country run by oligarchs, nor by a self-serving elite of authoritarian bureaucrats. The rotten form of capitalism is the neoliberal dystopia we see in the west right now, the rotten form of socialism is what the Soviet Union was by the end.
You want a socialist revolution? Good luck. But please think about how to prevent just shifting the wealth and power from one group of bad people to another over the course of a few decades.
This is nonsense, again.
The Soviet economy worked very well, and was one of the fastest growing economies of the 20th century. The difference between the wealthiest and the poorest was about 5 times, compared to hundreds to thousands in capitalist countries (and even more).
The PRC has a Socialist Market Economy, the large firms and key industries are state owned and planned. They are pragmatic and learned, which is why they maintained socialism.
Yes, the PRC is proof that socialism works astoundingly well.
Again, you return to vibes-based nonsense. The Soviet Union was more democratic than capitalist countries, and the PRC is as well.
yes it was. how do you think socialist countries went from pisspoor poorest in the planet to industrial powerhouses in just a few decades?
if you like the status quo fascism for whatever reason, why not say it in a less roundabout way? i mean why would you be punching left so fiercely in the face of it?
You want to see enemies, so you picture me like one.
Tell me one country that absolutely without doubt was able to improve the living standard and bring masses of people out of poverty, which is not China.
I am not a fanboy of China, but I respect that whatever they are doing in the last 30-40 years, because it works. Even through a biased Western lens it’s hard to deny that they are extremely successful. But China does not count. They drifted away from pure socialism right after Mao was done. The legacy of Mao is not that great. Both Stalin and Mao mainly produced repressions and famines.
And where is the rest of the “socialist block” which is supposedly successful right now, and not an authoritarian corrupt backwater? I know what you’ll say. The evil West has torpedoed everything everywhere. That’s too convenient.
I read the Capital, did you?
Don’t you dare telling me I hate the left.
I just dislike people who think they have found the ultimate answer and love their answer more than other people.
Economical and organizational structure is a tool to manage societies, not a fucking religion.
Cuba, USSR, Vietnam, etc. Socialism works.
China 100% counts as socialist. The Gang of Four diverged from Marxism-Leninism into ultraleft dogmatism. Ultraleftism is not “pure socialism,” there is no such thing as “pure” socialism, capitalism, etc. The PRC under Mao had markets, private property, etc, as did the USSR. As a consequence, the modern CPC is course-corrected to a standard Marxist-Leninist outlook. Both Mao and Stalin are seen as 70% good by the modern CPC.
The claims of “authoritarianism” are the repression of capitalists.
Yes, I’ve read Capital, volume 1. I’m on volume 2 right now. More importantly, I’ve read a ton of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and far more Marxist authors, all who speak about Dialectical Materialism and socialism, how to bring about communism, and more, all of which you won’t find in Capital. I’m skeptical that you’ve even read Volume 1, to be honest, your understanding of Marxism is incredibly poor. Using “I’ve read Capital” as an “I win the argument” tool is incredibly poor rhetoric, if you have a good argument, make it, don’t appeal to your own authority.
Yes, political theory isn’t a religion, you seem to think it is though.
please engage with reality, my man. i don’t want to “see” anything. the us have been killing and invading for decades all around the globe. my country was couped by it (and that doesnt narrow it down).
and yes china’s living standard improved in an unprecedented way since the revolution. they are not the only ones, btw, socialism does that.
the only reason i can think of for this detachment from facts is you don’t really care about the fascist status quo.
i mean its not you in the receiving end of any physical, psychological or economic violence.
Could not agree more. I’m a democratic socialist. I firmly believe that the ideas of that ideology, properly implemented, can drastically improve the standard of living for a huge percentage of the population.
I live in a country where our democratic socialist party is fantastically corrupt, lazy and completely bereft of any motivation to do anything that doesn’t directly benefit themselves. Consequently, I don’t support them. Results over ideology is an important mantra no matter what you believe.
All socialism is democratic, “democratic socialism” normally refers to reformist socialism. The corruption, in that case, makes sense, as reformism is usually conceding to the status quo.