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Why aren't you a socialist?

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I personally believe the best model in the world is none other than the Nordic model. A good and well funded welfare state, free market and capitalism. Today Scandinavian countries are among the best places in the world largely due to market reforms and competition, even the healthcare system and education system has plenty of elements of privatization to it as they simply view it that profit equals efficiency.

While it isn't perfect it certainly is still a very good form of "socialism" or you could put it that it is actually socialism-lite. It works in Nordic countries due to the general mentality of the people and for the most part there isn't that sense of entitlement. Surprisingly in a country that you can get welfare for just about any kind of condition there are hardly any benefit queens here, you rarely ever see in the tabloids of a single mother with 8 kids that draws from the state an astronomical income that 80% of the working population could never ever have. Surprisingly none of the Nordic countries suffer from a work-ethic crisis either.

Do I support socialism? Absolutely!! Except like democracy a country must be ready for it. At this moment in time UK is simply not ready for it as the first and foremost thing that is needed is proper mentality rather than the mentality of playing the system to get ahead.
Original post by Falcatas
Well Libertarian socialism is more akin to traditional socialism and it isn't as bad, but regardless the main argument between left and right libertarians are property rights. When I mean modern socialists I was meaning state socialism as most left wing political parties are.

However who can deny property rights? If there is no such thing as justly aquired property (obtained by contracting freely without coercion) then how you justify me not barging into your house?


As Captain Haddock very rightly pointed out, there's a difference between personal property and private property. Personal property could include things like your home or your mobile phone. Examples of private property could include factories and farms. They produce and contain capital and the means to produce more capital is humans work on it. Socialists oppose private property and not personal property. And to address the question of how that is determined (how I can claim ownership of my home, for example, in a socialist sense) it's based simply on use. I'm not renting out my home to someone else, I'm living in it and making full use of it, and in that sense I can claim legitimate ownership. It would be good if I would let other people live in it and to house them, but I can legitimately claim the right to refuse them as well. Again: it is private property, not personal property, that socialists object to.

And I think the arguments against private property are quite compelling if you're interested in looking them up (I often recommend Libertarian Socialist Rants' YouTube channel) By what right other than the threat of force can one claim ownership of farms that one is not working by ones own hand? It is absurd. The land should be owned by that community as a whole and those who work it, not a board of directors.

Original post by Falcatas
There is no reason that resources and necessary finite they may not be infinite but the very idea what constitutes a resource changes. Words like "sustainability" just stifle economic growth which will slow down human progress. Poor countries don't need sustainable development they just need development. Traditional socialists had no problem with consumerism and consumption. Even Marx said the capitalist class showed "what man's activity can bring about". Socialists like Sylvia Pankhurst said socialism meant plenty for all.

The idea that humans needs to cut down on all their consumption just suggests humans are virus and are a blight on the planet which is very misanthropic indeed.


This is the capitalist mindset I was so critical of: growth whatever the cost. It's parasitical and cancerous, and it's exactly why I see humans as a blight on this planet. If humans vanished from the world, the earth would get a lot healthier than it is now.

And I have to ask: What is the point of economic growth if it is not based on sustainability? If it will one day collapse, and if it wreaks havoc on the environment, ruining it for future generations particularly through climate change, then what will we have achieved when cities lie in ruins and humans have long since gone into extinction? If they don't have sustainable growth it will eventually collapse.

Original post by Falcatas
Instead of focusing on wealth inequality it is better to focus on creating more wealth for everyone. Economic growth makes everyone richer, (of course try to make help the poor more than the rich).


This notion simply is not true. It's a neo-liberal principle not backed up by evidence.

Tax Justice Network did a study in 2012 on this and found that wealth does not trickle down but is instead amassed in off-shore tax havens. There's enormous evidence that the trickle-down theory of wealth does not work: Here, here, here, and here, for example. The first one points to actual economic data which shows:

1. Cutting the top tax rate does not lead to economic growth.
2. Cutting the top tax rate does not lead to income growth.
3. Cutting the top tax rate does not lead to wage growth.
4. Cutting the top tax rate does not lead to job creation.


And then you move on to Thomas Picketty's latest work 'Capital in the 21st Century' which uses data over hundreds of years to demonstrate that the reality is that wealth creates wealth for those who have it faster than it does for the overall economy and that, in simple terms, under capitalism the rich necessarily get richer and it won't help anyone else. Elizabeth Warren summarised it:

At a reading at the Harvard Book Store, the Massachusetts Democrat, author of A Fighting Chance, was asked about Thomas Piketty's new book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century, and specifically about its contention that trickle-down economics "definitively do not work."


Warren cut in. "Can we say that part again? 'Definitely do not work,'" she repeated. "Not as in that's somebody else's opinion or this comes out of a long-held political opinion. The data don't lie on this. He's got good historical data, and boy, what it shows is trickle down doesn't work. Never did, doesn't work. Just so we're all clear on the baseline. I just saved you 1,100 pages of reading."
Original post by Axiomasher
This assertion brings us to question what is 'scientific'. There are plenty of people who study, for example, chimp behaviour, who would regard themselves as 'scientists' and who, no doubt, develop what they regard as scientific 'theories' about how chimp societies are organised. Where then do we draw the line between observation and theory related to chimp life and observation and theory related to human life? Are we not a social animal too?


Science is, broadly speaking, a method entailing the observation of empirical phenomena with clear concepts and variables operationalisations, allowing replication, the drawing of hypotheses, and prediction. This in abstraction proceeds by induction (i.e. accumulating sufficient instances of an empirical phenomena as to reliably make a claim on it), although in anthropological reality proceeds within paradigms (i.e. core intellectual frameworks structuring a discipline, with particular assumptions, vocabularies and truth-standards).

Marxism, conversely, follows from a metaphysic or method originating in Hegel's Logic. That is to say, the dialectic, which holds that things are essentially relational, and cannot be parsed into self-subsisting entities mechanically acting on one another. Their essential properties are not independent of the relations in which they stand. As such, the interaction, co-constitution and contradiction between aspects of the social world is privileged in analysis. Marx ultimately inversed Hegel's idealism into a materialism, and saw history as exhausted by the succession of modes of production and their corresponding class antagonisms (the social form of surplus value extraction). There is nothing particularly scientific, in the sense given (i.e. the canonical sense), about this. Moreover, deterministic readings of Marx are just bad.
Original post by Axiomasher
Maybe I don't see the distinction between disciplinary methods and objectives as being so clear. There is, for example, sociology which examines political behaviour, as there is psychology and, for that matter, anthropology, we could throw history in there too maybe. As I've suggested in an earlier post, we can make a distinction between Marxism as an explanation of what has happened and Marxism as an assertion of what will, or should, happen. Insofar as political theory is about what 'should' be I would take your point, but where political theory is applied to what 'has been' then Marxism can make a claim to 'science'. Without even looking I am confident that there will be papers published in distinguished scientific journals about chimp 'politics' for example.


Why do you keep mentioning chimpanzees? Yes, there are plenty of zoological studies showing how chimps behave....and? I don't get the relevance of your analogy..

Did Marx use a scientific method? How can he, when as with any historian it's based on an objective analysis of past accounts? If we say Edward I invaded Scotland, then we know this is true based on the accuracy of accounts either made by him or those in England under his reign.... To say though that any political theory is "science" is nonsense. Marx clearly thought that all societies were exploitative, that was his subjective morality and his own value judgments...it's different to say this is absolute fact, or fact proven beyond reasoned doubt. to say that poverty is a cause of crime is a sociological/scientific fact, to say societies have to be equal isn't.

If politics is a science, then so must be ethics or metaphysics, which cannot be possible.
Original post by neeson.storls
Why do you keep mentioning chimpanzees? Yes, there are plenty of zoological studies showing how chimps behave....and? I don't get the relevance of your analogy..

Did Marx use a scientific method? How can he, when as with any historian it's based on an objective analysis of past accounts? If we say Edward I invaded Scotland, then we know this is true based on the accuracy of accounts either made by him or those in England under his reign.... To say though that any political theory is "science" is nonsense. Marx clearly thought that all societies were exploitative, that was his subjective morality and his own value judgments...it's different to say this is absolute fact, or fact proven beyond reasoned doubt. to say that poverty is a cause of crime is a sociological/scientific fact, to say societies have to be equal isn't.

If politics is a science, then so must be ethics or metaphysics, which cannot be possible.


Marx has very little to do with value theory or morality, absent the contested presence of humanism in his early works, which is largely incidental to historical materialism. I agree, as stated above, that Marxism is not a science in the canonical sense, but I doubt you have ever seriously engaged with Marx from those comments.
I don't believe in economic equality....it's silly.

Anybody who says there should be such is citing a subjective moral system.....and?
Reply 46
Original post by Alfissti
I personally believe the best model in the world is none other than the Nordic model. A good and well funded welfare state, free market and capitalism. Today Scandinavian countries are among the best places in the world largely due to market reforms and competition, even the healthcare system and education system has plenty of elements of privatization to it as they simply view it that profit equals efficiency.

Sweden is going to be a 3rd world country ranked behind Libya in 15 years according to UN report
Original post by Republic1
You said it yourself. Nowhere has it been tried. The USSR and China were/are as far from Socialism as anyone else.


This is demagoguery, I said it hasn't been implemented in its 100% pure form, I didn't say that it hasn't been implemented at all. The key word here is ''tried''.

The same argument applies to free market capitalism as well. There has never been a moment, where the state hasn't regulated the market at all, thus the market has never been free in it's purest definition of the word. Is it then fitting for me to say that because the markets have never been free, that capitalism has never been implemented in its 100% purity - then every criticism directed at it is moot.

If you had a sense of proportion, you'd realize that it's almost impossible to ever implement an ideology in its 100% purity, because not all people are going to agree with it.

Original post by Republic1

Having a welfare state doesn't make you a Socialist nation. Europe is the perfect example of Capitalism's failure. The USA has a less restrictive capitalism and inequality is a major issue. Europe has slightly more regulated capitalism and inequality is still a major issue.


It certainly makes it a socialistic country, because welfare services are one of the main ways wealth is redistributed.

Whether inequality is an issue or not is contingent on your values. Unlike you, I don't consider wealth inequality to be an issue. If you live in a first world country, where you have so many opportunities to better your lot, the only reason you'd ever harp about economic inequality is if you're simply jealous of those, who are better off than you.

Original post by Republic1

Completely unregulated capitalism would be such a disaster that people dare not try it. That is because of the flaw inherent in capitalism. The continuous desire to acquire more capital. To become more wealthy. This perpetuates inequality.


What you describe is not a flaw, it's a rudimentary feature of human nature - that people will always be pursuing their own interests. Ambition and striving for a better life is a basic human desire that is completely irreconcilable with the socialist model, where every person is equal and on the same footing. As long as there are people, who are willing to work for a better life and people, who are lazy and would rather squander their life on cheap entertainment - there will always be inequality.

Socialism puts equality before freedom and thus necessarily reduces the latter. With less freedom, people have less options to make their lives better - this is why socialist systems fail. They fail, because socialists do not understand human nature on a fundamental level. They also do not understand that human nature is immutable and cannot be socially engineered. Every attempt at homo sovecticus has been a failure.

Original post by Republic1

I'd like to see more people draw a distinction between Capitalism and Free Markets. Free Markets can exists without Capitalism.


How can free markets exist without private property, with which people could trade with?
(edited 9 years ago)
Original post by mazigh
Sweden is going to be a 3rd world country ranked behind Libya in 15 years according to UN report


Cool story bro.
Reply 49
Original post by Alfissti
Cool story bro.

http://ww.rrojasdatabank.info/HDRP_2010_40.pdf
Ranked below Libya as well. Ain't it also rape capital of europe?
Because not all men are equal, in nature or ability or deserve things in equal measure.

Why should I fantasize differently?
Everything Marx said and predicted turned out to be utterly wrong.

He is a completely discredited figure, why people still look to his ideas is beyond me.
Original post by Rinsed
Everything Marx said and predicted turned out to be utterly wrong.

He is a completely discredited figure, why people still look to his ideas is beyond me.


Marx wasn't the only socialist you know... other socialists opposed him even in his time.
Original post by The Socktor
Marx wasn't the only socialist you know... other socialists opposed him even in his time.


Yea but the OP seems to think his ideas are the science his adherents claimed.
I'm not a socialist as I'm not poor, I don't care much for the socialist aims, hate marx and all that jazz.
Original post by kaneboy
Fascism can be most accurately defined as the political belief that the state is more important than the individual. This belief is what allowed fascists to justify pursuing "racial purification" of humanity. They considered the individual rights of those they killed as less important than the greater good that they fervently believed would come to humanity through the supremacy of a certain race. Essentially, fascism focused on community, rather than the individual, which is undoubtedly a hallmark of the left wing.

In fact, Nazi is an acronym for National SOCIALIST German Worker's Party. Obviously a self-declared socialist worker's party is very clearly left-wing.


I don't quite agree.

We have to distinguish between the rhetoric of fascism and the reality. While fascist regimes may talk up 'community', 'unity' and so on as if everyone is 'in it together' their actual characteristic is to be very hierarchical and dictatorial. Should you familiarise yourself with the history of socialist political theory and philosophy you will see that egalitarianism not hierarchy is a central theme. The use of the term 'socialism' in 'National Socialism' was just populist rhetoric and highly misleading; indeed the first victims of the Nazi regime were the real socialists and communists who were recognised as being most strongly opposed to Hitler's fascist ideology.

Just because a political party claims to represent X doesn't of itself mean that they do represent X, we have to look at what they actually did and what their actual aims were.
Original post by Rinsed
Everything Marx said and predicted turned out to be utterly wrong.

He is a completely discredited figure, why people still look to his ideas is beyond me.


Except that Marx didn't set a date by which capitalism would suffer transformation or overthrow. At the very least Marx's claim that capitalism is highly transformative (of itself, the world and of social relations) and is ridden with 'internal contradictions' which generate repeated conflict, is pretty much on the button. We might just be at the high-water mark of capitalism, in which case proclamations of Marx's alleged error are easily premature.
Reply 57
Original post by Rinsed
Yea but the OP seems to think his ideas are the science his adherents claimed.

Ever heard of Che Guevara? He didn't mean that it is science he just wanted to stress on how much he believed in socialism. It is quite obvious that socialism is the only true system to end out miseries. We love in Europe. We can't really sympathise with those nations which are truly victimised. Do you know what people suffer in China and Bangladesh? Do you half a million people die of hunger every year. We need to feel a little guilt sometimes. Why should others pay for our lifestyle?
I think with socialism we can lead better lives without having to make others suffer. Of course, colonialism in the 1900s sense of the world is long gone but as big companies move their production to China for cheap labour then the economy becomes more and more dependant on it and will never think of ways to improve the lives of people. They practise despotism on people just because we allow it. This ****'s got to go. In an alternative economy, people will control big companies and they are the ones to decide where production will take place, how much they will pay the workers and everything else. This is democracy. How can we run the country democratically if banks and big corporations are privatised and we have little say in what they do?
Original post by neeson.storls
I don't believe in economic equality....it's silly.

Anybody who says there should be such is citing a subjective moral system.....and?


What kind of 'moral system' isn't subjective? As soon as you offer up how things 'ought' to be you're ultimately making an appeal to morals. No political position can escape that.
Original post by Aj12
Political beliefs are not tangible in the way newtonian physics are. One can be proved the other cannot. You can't prove capitalism or Marxism are correct. Politics becomes dangerous when you start to believe you are stating absolute truths, beyond reproach, it leads to fanaticism.


Well, actually, you can't prove either of them. All you can do is disprove a scientific theory. But since Newtonian physics hasn't been disproved for something like 300 years now, we can probably assume it never will be.

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