Am I a socialist?

Discussion in 'Socialism' started by edwhys211, Jan 7, 2013.

  1. Summerhill

    Summerhill Member

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    I would have replied to your crit of my post but reading your replies to odonII ...er I don't think theres much point !
     
  2. IamnotaMan

    IamnotaMan I am Thor. On sabba-tickle. Still available via us

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    1)Yes I did read what you wrote. Did you read mine? And Socialism does NOT demand State control. That is why I put the word Communism in instead of Socialism.

    Communism, Socialism, and Social Democracy are all different terms, but sometimes used for similar things. Do you know what the Bolshevik and Menshevik terms originally related to?

    You've lost me on the rest of it.

    2)I didn't say that Buffett was a Socialist. But he displays SOME Socialist values ie restraint against excess materialism and against nepotism. AND considers helping the poorest.

    There's no reason whatsoever to say he could not have made billions in a Socialist system. I won't quote China because China is bizarre. However, Europe has had many Socialist governments, and many of the World's wealthiest billionaires grew up during these governments.

    Infact, trace most economic success stories and you'll find the State had a big hand in it.

    3)Its not that hard. Try again.

    4)What? you disagree? Again its not that complicated.

    5)You seem to be unaware that Socialism can exist within a World/ country that has Capitalist facets. I wasn't referring to US Reps vs Democrats.

    You need to get away from the American definition spouted by Newt Gingringe's kind. And look at the internationally accepted definitions.
     
  3. Lostthoughts

    Lostthoughts Thostloughts

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    It is my understanding that profit isn't generally distributed equally in Socialism. People will make more money if they do a particularly difficult or important job. Doctors will make more than garbage men, managers will make more than laborers. A Socialist society would still have an upper class, a middle class, and a lower class. It just wouldn't have the ultra rich multi-billionaires, because Socialism doesn't allow you to "own" multiple businesses. You don't make all the money and give a cut back to those who earned it, you make only what you personally earn.

    I believe that you are thinking of Communism. Unlike Socialism, Communism has no social classes. Everyone is payed the same amount no matter what they do. The only incentive is to benefit the group by doing your best. It assumes that people will want to make the most out of their lives, and will work to their max potential without financial incentive. In the purest form of Communism, there would be no government and no money.

    I am not as informed about Communism as I am about Socialism, because I don't believe that Communism is realistic at this point in history. I think Communism is rarely relevant to anything and I generally avoid talking about it.

    There's no surplus. Those numbers add up to $1,000. I think I gave a decent answer to this question above, but let me know if I should expand.

    That's not what I was trying to say. I sorry if I worded anything poorly.

    The difference is not a disparity in wages. The difference is that in capitalism, the owner of a corporation will bring home more money than any of the workers, even though he did none of the actual work.

    For example, the CEO of Wal Mart makes more money in an hour than the average Wal Mart employee does in a year. He didn't make any of the merchandise, he didn't transport it to the store, he didn't put it on the shelves, he didn't sell it.

    It is my understanding that in Socialism, there would be no CEO. Each Wal Mart would operate individually, and all of the Wal Mart's profits would be divided among the people who actually operate the store. It's not the fact that the CEO gets paid more, it's the fact that he gets paid for the work of others. If everyone was paid only for the amount of work they actually do, the general population would have more money and a much higher standard of living.


    This is true, and very important. Please keep it in mind when reading everything I wrote. I'm trying to shy away from specifics, because there are many, many, versions of capitalism, communism, and socialism, and they all have different ways of achieving their goal.

    However, they are 3 different things. Just because there are many versions of each doesn't mean that there aren't major differences between the 3. At their most basic levels, the systems can be described as.

    Socialism: Workers control the means of production. (exactly how this would work may very greatly, but all true definitions of Socialism would fall into this category.)
    Capitalism: A group of private individuals control the means of production. (It isn't necessarily a small group, but the group tends to grow smaller as capitalism progresses. Every example of capitalism would fall into this category.)


    I hope I made myself a little clearer. I am by no means an expert on economics, so feel free to challenge anything I say. The extent of my knowledge on this subject comes from reading a few books.
     
  4. Lostthoughts

    Lostthoughts Thostloughts

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    I understand that Socialism doesn't mean state control and I realize that you wrote the word Communism.

    You went from talking about Socialism to Communism mid paragraph for no apparent reason. We were talking about Socialism, not communism. The post that I quoted didn't mention communism, my post that you quoted didn't mention communism, and the title of the thread doesn't mention Communism. After you accused me of thinking like a right wing american, you tried to back up your point by explaining that Communism sometimes has incentives for people who work hard. We were not talking about Communism.
    You were arguing against a point that no one ever brought up. You belittled my point of view, then switched topics completely.

    Agreed. What is your point?

    I do not. Please enlighten me.

    You strongly implied that he was a socialist by stating,
    In the two sentences before you brought up Buffett. I don't really understand why that fact that Buffett has some socialist values matters at all. What point were you trying to make by bringing him up?

    We agree on one thing.

    I'm talking about the Socialism outlined by Marx. Would you say that those governments fall under Marx's definition of Socialism, or would they be more of a pseudo-socialist capitalism where big government controls a lot of programs to assist the poor and middle classes?

    I understand what you said. I don't see any way of connecting it to the discussion in a productive way. Smugly telling me to "try again" accomplishes nothing.

    What the fuck does Newt Gingrich have to do with anything? Literally nothing I have said derives from or aligns with misinformed republicans rambling about how America is becoming Socialist.
    Internationally accepted by who? I'm basing my definitions off of reading Marx, and pro-socialist books analyzing Marx and Socialism.



    If you respond to this. Please respond with some moderately legible formatting. Numbering your paragraphs doesn't make your post any easier to read. For the love of god please take the extra 3 seconds to put your response to a statement under the statement itself.
     
  5. unedited

    unedited Member

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    The first post describes something approaching socialism, which would be consistent with my self-description as socialistISH. The second is a question about if you care about the label. I'm not sure I do care about the label, so it's consistent with my politics. Narf.


    Nah, that's some excuses. No offence. The definitions were simplistic yes, but also a bit inaccurate. As stated previously the public are made up of private individuals.

    Ah, now we're getting closer.

    I'd question the use of the word 'workers' though. We're all 'workers' in some way.

    Better for me would be: "In a socialist system control of the means of production* is distributed evenly amongst the population"

    *IMnvHO the whole 'means of production' stuff is 150 years out of date.


    And in my politics, we would aim to generally distribute the 'means of production' (the profits of labour) more evenly amongst the population. The underlined words are to highlight that it would be impossible to distribute profit perfectly equally. But we'd give it a go. And being honest about the fact that perfect equality is impossible, makes fighting inequality less of a pipedream.

    ----

    As a general (and not intended to be provocative, intended to be invitation to discuss) question though - in the real world is it possible to make such clear divisions between 'socialist' and 'capitalist' systems? Would it be more useful to acknowledge that all different systems of political and economic organisation are ongoing processes of messy and fluctuating dialectics between various complexities of ideology, some of which might be apparently dominant at various points in time but which will be changed and changing even as we try and work out what they are?

    (lol at the waffle... but it's semi-deliberate - most politics IS incomprehensibly silly.)

    :D
     
  6. Lostthoughts

    Lostthoughts Thostloughts

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    Haha, I know. I was just feeling antagonistic yesterday.

    Agreed that they could have been worded better.

    What about the unemployed?

    Everyone who works and contributes to society controls the means of production. There may be programs to help the lazy or unemployed survive, but they don't have any real control. They just benefit from the goodwill of the workers.

    I think that would be Communism. I may very well be off in my understanding of the difference between the two, but in my understanding:
    -One of the main goals of socialism is to stop the wealth from being controlled by a group of private individuals. However, it is still very much based on financial incentives for those who work hard. It tries to increase the quality of life for the working middle class. (but those who don't work don't control anything). One of the most major and fundamental differences between Capitalism and Socialism is that in later, "ownership of property" doesn't exist in the same way it does in Capitalism.

    -After Socialism, it progresses to Communism. This is where the wealth is distributed as equally as possible amongst everyone, whether they work or not. It assumes people will want to live up to their full potential and will do their best without financial incentive.

    Correct me if your understanding of the difference between the two is different.

    What leads you to believe that?

    (I'm not sure what "*IMnvHO" means, but I assume you added the nv by mistake)


    Seems reasonable, but how would you go about distributing it (somewhat) equally? Government taking from the rich and giving to the poor? Eliminating the idea of "ownership"?


    I don't think there has ever been a socialist country that operates exactly in the way I am speaking of. I think people tend to define socialism as "redistribution of wealth", or a "welfare state". Where you tax the rich to build programs for the poor and middle class.

    While this type of government might reflect the general mentality and morality of socialism, it is not a socialist government. It's a kind of left leaning capitalism, because it is still built on the idea of ownership. The rich get rich by inheriting money and making money from to work of others. Some people like to say that America is becoming Socialist, but in order to become socialist it would need to completely change it's economic structure. What they mean to say is, "America is turning into a welfare state". The two aren't the same and you can point to the exact ways in which they are different.

    Socialism tries to renounce the idea of ownership, which is almost never what people are talking about when they invoke the word. I think it is realistic to make the divisions this clear in the real world. However, doing so would mean that a lot less people would spend time talking about socialism at all.

    They are completely different economic structures and just because one sometimes reflects the values of the other, it doesn't magically become some kind of Capitalist-Socialist hybrid.
     
  7. unedited

    unedited Member

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    Lol, you do better than me. I'm always antagonistic even when I don't want to be.


    Even the unemployed are part of the system, they receive and distribute wealth and have an effect on productivity - a lot of protest movements are made up of people who are technically unemployed but through picketing, occupation, direct action (climbing a very tall monument to exploitation as in the shard climb), political education of workers... and so on... they are able to exert control of some sort. The only control a 'worker' has (without some form of ownership) is the withdrawal of their labour (the only thing they *coughs* have ownership of) (*coughs* because even that's debatable).

    So anyone who is active within the system has some form of control - the smallest example would be where to buy from, or who (in the case of 'criminal' elements) to steal from. Barring severe physical or mental health problems we all have SOME control over our economic activities. So in some way we're all workers. Some have more control than others but it's that proportion of control that seems to be at the heart of how we're defining the differences between systems.

    (lmao @ myself... I have keyboard diarrhea... sorry for not entirely coherent/on-topic ramble)

    I can't correct you (damn it) - we have different opinions maybe. Where you're saying socialism doesn't have 'ownership of property in the same way as capitalism' for me, the ending of 'ownership of property' would be communism.

    Property, means of production, capital, profit - if the state distributes these "equally" amongst the population, that's what I call communism.

    For me, socialism is where property etc are owned by individuals, but there are checks and balances to ensure as far as possible that large inequalities of ownership are avoided. So there's an overlap between 'socially responsible' capitalistish systems and free-ish market socialist(ish) systems

    Dunno really, just "means of production" sounds out of date in this era of profit margins and surplus productivity.

    I have to admit the nv stands for a quietly spoken *ahem* "not very" ;)


    Ah. Now that's the tough one. If I knew that, I'd be rich. Personally... er... well... ah... um...

    It starts with rebuilding the democratically accountable state. But, I don't believe in 'solutions', only trying to get things slowly less wrong in an ongoing process of small do-able steps.

    But, as an example (and everything is predicated on reform of the state so it's democratically accountable) - The state (which in theory represents the people) has a stake in every private company operating in the country - so every company is part 'owned' by the state. This means 'we' share any profits - tax dodging becomes more difficult. 'We' also get voting rights, to decide how the company is run and who runs it. 'We' (our government) doesn't have to excercise that right, unless the company starts misbehaving.

    It's like an extension of the John Lewis/Waitrose model.


    I'm with that.

    As I read it, you've got the differences between socialism and capitalism pretty tightly defined. And I can go with that. And what you're saying (I think) is that people don't get that just because some ideas from theoretical 'socialism' or 'capitalism' are used to run real economies, in the real world... that doesn't make the system in the REAL world socialist, or indeed capitalist (?). And I can go with that too, if I read it right lol.

    Fair enough - but if that's the case, isn't it true of capitalism as well?

    WOOHOO! Finally I can really disagree!!

    For me, every system's some mixture of not just these two ideologies but also the ideology of every individual within the system. Every country is run according to hybrid ideology.

    Say we have 1 person who believes in... I dunno... some real whacky shizzle. That person lives in the system, and their actions and interactions take place within the system - and are influenced by their own whacky beliefs. So the system (which only exists as the people who run it) is also influenced even in tiny tiny ways, by the whacky ideologies of that individual through the old action/reaction thing.

    The differences are in which ideologies are dominant, and how much.

    (I make no apologies for the length of reply. Big Brother was on TV.)

    :daisy:
     
  8. IamnotaMan

    IamnotaMan I am Thor. On sabba-tickle. Still available via us

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    You're not wrong there mate.


    I knew there'd be something we'd agree on.
    Wow... :rolleyes:
     
  9. YouFreeMe

    YouFreeMe Visitor

    Hey, OP!

    Take this little quiz:

    http://www.politicalcompass.org/

    That might give you a bit of an idea on whether or not you are a socialist. Asking biased people on the internet isn't always your best option :).
     
  10. themnax

    themnax Senior Member

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    when a nation earns its keep, its called socialist. when it kills you for being honest, that is what is called fascism.
    when it begins and ends in little green pieces of paper, signifying nothing, but motivating needlessly destructive behavior, i'm sorry, but that's what is called capitalism.
     

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