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[+] 58 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (9 children)
  • [–] 8 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Well it depends on how you define "socialism" which is used to mean anything from a socialist policy to a fully socialist society. For some socialist policies, you can simply vote in some socialists into a parliamentary system and get them to pass some.

    But there's never been enough socialists peacefully voted into power to make a fully socialist/communist society, so those attempts have always come at the barrel of a gun, which so far has always resulted in an authoritarian regime.

    I'd love to see one actually get voted into power someday, but I have a feeling I will be waiting for a very long time.

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    [–] 34 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    We're angry about unbridled end-stage capitalism

    Just like with everything in life, there's a right amount of something and its not zero. Properly regulated free market is probably the best economic system we've come up with. I challenge you to come up with a better system.

    Its the fact that we've voted in greedy leaders and have such lax rules about lobbying and open bribery that's allowed so much shit to happen.

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  • [+] 14 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 child)
  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    It's not but it can't be divorced form capitalism either.

    A farmer does not produce grain out of the goodness of his heart. He's doing it to provide for his family's needs and wants, maybe new clothes for his kids or a new stove, etc. We work jobs to get paid so we can feed ourselves and our families and maybe buy something nice or shiny once in a while and save for retirement.

    Production of commodities and services, profit-motive, capital accumulation, If that's not the basis of capitalism, I'm not sure what is?

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  • [–] 10 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Capitalism is private control over the factors of production. So you can for example have a socialist society in which the factors of production are owned by the community, but there's still markets and commerce.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago

    One hurdle we have to deal with is the assumption by the general public that markets = capitalism.

    You tell people capitalism has failed them and they worry that you mean to take away their ability to buy a latte.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago

    That has been gone over by Marx over 150 years ago. I'm not going to go over everything Marx said about capitalism, he wrote an entire book called Das Kapital about it. Here's a summary that does a pretty good job at getting Marx's ideas across. You can skip the first 2-3 chapters as the main criticism of capitalism starts around chapter 4. But some things refer back to the previous chapters so you might want to watch them if some parts of Marx's ideas aren't very clear.

    As for you points, I'll do a short summary:

    • Production of commodities and services is not capitalistic, we've been producing commodities and services for more than a millennia before capitalism was even a concept.
    • Profit-motive is a poorly defined concept if we want to divorce it from capitalism. Profit-motive in the sense that I want to make all the money is capitalistic. But if we talk about the "profit-motive" in the sense that I want money so I could buy things I want to use, Marx argues that is not capital and not capitalism.
    • Marx has a very specific definition of capital where capital is something that exists for the purpose of making more capital. If you make $10 mil and you buy a fancy house, that $10 mil you got is not capital and the house you bought is also not is not capital, but if you take that $10 mil and you for instance invest it with the purpose of getting $20 mil later, now it's capital. The capitalist definition of capital doesn't acknowledge the purpose money or things, so everything is capital which also makes it impossible to separate capital accumulation from just owning things you need to live your life. Your house is not capital, your car is not capital, your phone is not capital, the money you're saving up for a trip to the Bahamas is not capital. But if you own a company and the means of production within that company and you're buying in labor to use your means of production so you could siphon surplus value from the laborers work, that's capital.

    The things you've brought up aren't necessarily the basis of capitalism. They're the basis of capitalism only if you want them to be the basis of capitalism.

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  • [–] 30 points 2 years ago (2 children)
  • [–] 21 points 2 years ago*

    The only real problem I have with capitalism is the people that refuse to consider any other way of operating, refuse to rein it in, or immediately make it a binary choice between capitalism and “scary” communism.

    Economic systems don’t need to be corralled into boxes and never be allowed cross lines. The people forcing that take are the ones profiting from the status quo, by power and/or wealth.

    Any of the systems can be combined, the problem is fight against greed that makes people bend the system to funnel power money to a specific group. Whether it be the dictator and his cronies or a bunch of oligarchs. If this cannot be prevented, then no system will work without eventually crushing the average person.

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  • [–] 20 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    No....not everyone hates capitalism. Everyone hates uncontrolled capitalism.

    Socialism isn't some magical bandaid that will make everything better. It has a shit ton of it's own problems and downfalls...nearly all of which are conveniently glossed over by leftists.

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  • [+] 12 points 2 years ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)
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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (8 children)

    You clearly have never read anything about it, so I’d be curious to know specifically which part of socialist theory you disagree with.

    Everyone hates uncontrolled capitalism

    Yeah, that's capitalism. By definition, capitalism demands to be uncontrolled and without rules to bring the most profit. So when you're done pulling stuff out of thin air, let us know

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    [–] 18 points 2 years ago
    [–] 13 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    Socialism and capitalism have a lot of overlap. This belief and meme that they are completely separate is incredibly simple-minded and indicative of US thinking patterns. US Americans have had it beaten into their heads that there are only two sides for so long that it permeates their very being.

    To have a fair system, components of multiple philosophies and systems will have to be mixed. Treating capitalism as all bad is plain dumb.

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    [–] 7 points 2 years ago

    "Everything is fucked.... how can this be?!"

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Socialism won't keep dragons from hoarding their gold. You would just be taken advantage of for the same thing, your labor, through a different channel.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago* (5 children)

    Well, sometimes events pushed into motion or accelerated by a "root cause" develop lives of their own. Without concerted effort neither with capitalism nor with the absence/alternative of/to capitalism will we solve climate change or patriarchy.

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