Communism.

[warri0r45]

Communism basically establishes equality by all people by throwing away ideas of ownership. In a Communist state, no one would own anything, including property, and everyone would work for the common good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The only time communism has ever been put into effect "successfully" has been when a dictator decides to make the country it governs communistic. However, the dictator doesn't want to give up its control and so it stays the "leader" - and the effect is that under the guise of "communism," the government takes control of everything.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Capitalism is an economic system. It establishes anywhere from free to a mostly free market, such as the United States. Capitalism is often seen as the opposite of communism because capitalism is all about doing business yourself, and therefore owning things, whereas communism is about no ownership. Capitalism basically just abolishes government-owned businesses and relies on the entire market to be run by the people - either privately or corporately.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ditto.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Although communism (in theory) isnt terribly bad, it is often manipulated by despotistic figures such as Stalin, Pol Pot, et al

[BlueLancer]

communism is basically a perfect society, but human nature creates its defects.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

capitalism is basically people that compete in an open economy for the higest pay (or capital). amierca is highly capitalistic, along with most of the developed world. in other words, the person who works the hardest earns the most for their well being, and for their use specificly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You have made a major mis-assumption by saying capitalism means "the person who works the hardest earns the most". You missed the point why capitalists were earlier called "pigs".

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The people who earn the most in a capitalistic system are not those who work 18 hour shifts 7 days a week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The people who earn the most are billionaires who don't even need to work 1 minute a day, but let their money lay in funds and high interest bank accounts, and generate hundreds of millions a year doing nothing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And some of those people got their original wealth "unfairly", i.e. grand inheritances, etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Which in turn means while these people have even more and more money to pay for goods and drive up the prices, the 18-hour-shift worker is forced to pay more with his normal salary and getting nothing in return except spending more money on consumables.

[issy2]

I think we have too much freedom to be honest, i personally believe in the perfect world that Postive Freedom would be best for everyone. This is where you are forced into doing what you as a rational person would do. For example if you had an exam the next day, the rational thing to do would stay in and revise. Using this concept of postive freedom you would be forced to do this. Under Negative Freedom we are free to self-destruct ourselves.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

However, i doubt if i actually lived in those circumstances i would be happy at the time. I'd much rather go out with my friends but in the long run it'd do me good to stay in and revise.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Would you rather be sociaable, or academic?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This I think is one of the huge problems in our society. Everything is based on materialism and wealth. In fact there is a European country (again my dad told me this so it may not be true :) ) that allows families 3 day weekends. However in England and America too, it's all about money. Where does happiness come in? I s'pose it doesn't really count. When Tony Blair sits down for a meeting with the Labour party I'm sure he's not thinking about the happiness in his country, just making money. At least that's the picture I get...

[Duke_Freedom]

All of your life you've dreamt about becoming a profession. You've good grades for it, you feel you know what your getting yourself into. But neither you nor your parents can pay for the education. Or you could, but then you fell seriously ill and when to pay for the medical expenses you had to spend all the money.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apart from taking the rare occasional situation where socialism is fairer then capitalism, why not also mention the abundance of situations where socialism is anything but fair?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Let's say we have this guy here, who's 20 and quite intelligent. However, he is extremely lazy and thus dropped out of school. To make a living he had to take a job, but, because of his lazy attitude, he was fired within a month in the several jobs he had over time. Now the government feels sorry for this guy and so they pay the guy social security.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In other words, other hard working people who pay tax have to pay for this guy's food, water and home just because the guy himself is too lazy to work? How is that fair?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now again, let me state that socialism as ideology is not wrong either. However in practice, it oftenly works out more negative then positive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I do think a mix of capitalism and socialism is the best to go, but the socialism part of it has to be severely controlled to avoid abuse - and that part is totally lacking in reality. IMO you just absolutely can't justify lazy people living off the money earned by the hard working class.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The people who earn the most are billionaires who don't even need to work 1 minute a day, but let their money lay in funds and high interest bank accounts, and generate hundreds of millions a year doing nothing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And some of those people got their original wealth "unfairly", i.e. grand inheritances, etc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you already half-pointed out yourself, one of the problems in your arguement is that most billionaires had to work hard to become billionaire in the first place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For the rest, I don't see why grand inheritances are so "unfair". Someone still worked for that cash at some point and I'd consider it completely normal that parents want their children to have a good future. I don't see why giving your children money should be taxed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The problem of socialism is that it thinks they can tax money earned 5 times under the arguement that it is "fairer" that way. Therefore, in practice, socialism is very similiar to communism as it tries to reach equality and fairness too much under the same assumption that people are generally "good".

[BlueLancer]

For the rest, I don't see why grand inheritances are so "unfair". Someone still worked for that cash at some point and I'd consider it completely normal that parents want their children to have a good future. I don't see why giving your children money should be taxed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm not for taxing inheritances, I actually strongly oppose it. I was responding to the point that the guy who works 18 hours a day is not actually 'the big winner' of society, quite on the contrary.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Despite how hard you work, every human has only 24 hours in his day. Some people just spent those hours more efficiently and became m/billionaires. No, it's not fair for the "average worker" who put more effort in his job and yet he's over 100,000 times (or more) poorer than some other guy who did half the work he did.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don't believe in equal distribution of wealth either, so I'd admit I have no solution. Why bother sharing your fortune with, for example, those who don't even want to do anything to get wealth?

[Jaakilju]

Venenzuela, Hugo Chavez.

 

 

 

I think he's one of the best socialist leaders in a long time.

 

 

 

He has done good job for the majority of the people, and I think that's what counts, not the oillords. USA been pretty pissed about not getting their oil? Or so I've heard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think Communism may not work for a long time in our society, but a mix of socialism/capitalism with a lot more socialism might be the best option.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The welfare system here in scandinavia works pretty good, and it's a part of the leftist/socialist ideals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty messy post, because of umm... :-$

[BlueTear]

Apart from taking the rare occasional situation where socialism is fairer then capitalism, why not also mention the abundance of situations where socialism is anything but fair?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rare? What's rare, poor people?

 

 

 

Let's say we have this guy here, who's 20 and quite intelligent. However, he is extremely lazy and thus dropped out of school. To make a living he had to take a job, but, because of his lazy attitude, he was fired within a month in the several jobs he had over time. Now the government feels sorry for this guy and so they pay the guy social security.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In other words, other hard working people who pay tax have to pay for this guy's food, water and home just because the guy himself is too lazy to work? How is that fair?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ah yes, and what a home it is, and all the fun stuff he can do during his copious amounts of free time! He can go to the movies... No wait, he can't actually afford that. He can sit behind his computer! Well, actually, he can't afford a computer. He can enjoy is luxurious home! Err... Yeah, right, like he could afford to stay at a good place? Hmmm.... Enjoy delicious meals, then? Fast boiled, ultra cheap noodles. Ride around in his car, perhaps? ... what car, and what gas money?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But hey, he's not working! Well, strictly speaking, in order to lift the social security check he needs to report to a public institution and apply for jobs a set number of hours every week, so technically speaking, he actually has a part time job for the government; Finding himself a job!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

... you think this guy A) Is more common than the person who couldn't chose a career because he was born with poor parents B) Actually enjoys his life? I mean seriously, let's not glorify not-working. You have no pocket money, the list of things you'd like to do - and not big things like traveling around the world either, but small things like taking that cute chick at the supermarket to a movie - but can't because you just don't have the money is huge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As for fair... I don't really give rat's [wagon] whether a democratic society manages to be "fair". Fair is a word for kids who thinks some other kid got a bigger slice of the cake. What I want from a democratic society is freedom for it's citizens.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And no matter how "unfair" you happen to think it is that everyone contributes to providing a freedom of choice for everyone when it comes to their lives, the fact is that an arbitarily chosen baby born in a system that employs capitalism alongside socialism is going to have more freedom of choice than an arbitarily chosen baby born in a fully capitalistic system.

[Duke_Freedom]

Rare? What's rare, poor people?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

People using social security for legimitate reasons. But ok, using the word "rare" was a 'bit' of an exaggeration.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ah yes, and what a home it is, and all the fun stuff he can do during his copious amounts of free time! He can go to the movies... No wait, he can't actually afford that. He can sit behind his computer! Well, actually, he can't afford a computer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hell, this is not America. In the country I'm living in, you surely can still afford all that (within reason, ofcourse) with social security income. So please keep the sarcasm to yourself - my point remains.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But hey, he's not working! Well, strictly speaking, in order to lift the social security check he needs to report to a public institution and apply for jobs a set number of hours every week, so technically speaking, he actually has a part time job for the government; Finding himself a job!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

God forbid that we force such people to look for a job. If I remember well, there has been a (ridiculous) time in history where applying for jobs wasn't even required here. That is socialism for you - when it goes too far.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

... you think this guy A) Is more common than the person who couldn't chose a career because he was born with poor parents B) Actually enjoys his life? I mean seriously, let's not glorify not-working. You have no pocket money

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Already pointed out the "no pocket money" is pure bs, at least in the country where I'm living in. And yes over here the lazy-type people I mentioned are quite common.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And no matter how "unfair" you happen to think it is that everyone contributes to providing a freedom of choice for everyone when it comes to their lives

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don't think you read what I said very well. I actually agreed that the good-willing poor-workers class kid who wants to study physics at some university should get the chance to do so - in fact, it would be idiotic not to let him study that, as, eventually, the whole society will profit from it.

 

 

 

However, that doesn't mean I'm also willing to pay for the lazy kid's [wagon] who doesn't want to work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My point is that socialism generally means that you get both (the upside and the downside) or none. Therefore any social securities should, IMO, be severely controlled to prevent abuse. To a certain, but reasonable, extend that may also mean it will limit your so beloved "freedom" too. For example:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*Assume 1% of all people in the world want to study psychology and that the 'demand' for psychologists would only be 0.1%... Then we would have to "limit" the 'freedom' of 0.9% of the people by totally disallowing them to study psychology as they'd never find a job with that study.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*please don't argue about the realism of the numbers used, just argue the concept if you see the need to do so.

[Bufoman]

comunisim works in thery but not in real life. part of this is becouse it creates great inequalitys by trying to make every one equal. if no one owns property then no one has any reson to respect or care about it, take public bathrooms for example. now think about privately owned ones, which one would you rather use?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

absolute power corrupts absolutely history has taught us this time and time again (read 1984 for an example). take a look at all the current comunist states and find me one, just one that has deliverd its promise of an equal utopia. it could not be the former ussr, or the peoples republic of china, or north korea.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

the goverment that gets into power tends to be as corrupt as it is stupid. misapropreations of recources are far more comon becouse the consequences of ineficency do not affect the ruleing class who make the decisions. In a free market economy if your inefficent your buisness fails. in comunisim its a simple matter of forgery to convince the people you have exceeded your quota.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

fourther more in a system where you do not own anything you have the basic human needs and rights denied to you, you become a slave to the party. the only people you can elect are from the party, the party is corrupt so any choice you can make is not going to make things any better for yourself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

in thery this system of goverment may work but only if the ruleing class and over seers where machines with out feeling or greed. or alternitively It could become so corrupt and evil as to mimic big brother in the book 1984.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

in closeing comunisem does not work for more resons than I could possably list on this fourm.

[Loge_05]

Eventually, under Communism, government will dwindle away and will no longer be needed as everyone will know what they have to do and what they're place is. Although that practice has never been followed. Your father obviously has an example in mind, why not ask him to explain?

[Jaakilju]

comunisim works in thery but not in real life. part of this is becouse it creates great inequalitys by trying to make every one equal. if no one owns property then no one has any reson to respect or care about it, take public bathrooms for example. now think about privately owned ones, which one would you rather use?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

absolute power corrupts absolutely history has taught us this time and time again (read 1984 for an example). take a look at all the current comunist states and find me one, just one that has deliverd its promise of an equal utopia. it could not be the former ussr, or the peoples republic of china, or north korea.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

the goverment that gets into power tends to be as corrupt as it is stupid. misapropreations of recources are far more comon becouse the consequences of ineficency do not affect the ruleing class who make the decisions. In a free market economy if your inefficent your buisness fails. in comunisim its a simple matter of forgery to convince the people you have exceeded your quota.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

fourther more in a system where you do not own anything you have the basic human needs and rights denied to you, you become a slave to the party. the only people you can elect are from the party, the party is corrupt so any choice you can make is not going to make things any better for yourself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

in thery this system of goverment may work but only if the ruleing class and over seers where machines with out feeling or greed. or alternitively It could become so corrupt and evil as to mimic big brother in the book 1984.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

in closeing comunisem does not work for more resons than I could possably list on this fourm.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Venezuela, on it's path.

[kelem_ryu]

Under Negative Freedom we are free to self-destruct ourselves.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm making heavy use of my freedom :uhh:

[apinagez]

For anybody saying Venezuela is in the right path... Just forget it. Chavez doesn't deserve any credibility.

[Jaakilju]

For anybody saying Venezuela is in the right path... Just forget it. Chavez doesn't deserve any credibility.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why not?

 

 

 

I've seen him do good for the most of the population of Venezuela. Maybe not for the oil-owners/americans but meh, it's Venezuela, not USA.

[jak722]

 

For anybody saying Venezuela is in the right path... Just forget it. Chavez doesn't deserve any credibility.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why not?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dude you're asking for flames with that question...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just move on and think as if nothing happened. :uhh:

[issy2]

And while we're on the topic...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What's socialism, and what's liberality? (liberal, or whatever. Probably got the word wrong... :roll: )

[Faux]

AFAIK, liberalism is the idea that holds freedom and individual rights above anything else. Socialism is the idea that the government should handle the distribution of the country's wealth.

[issy2]

AFAIK, liberalism is the idea that holds freedom and individual rights above anything else. Socialism is the idea that the government should handle the distribution of the country's wealth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks. And another question I have -

 

 

 

According to pure Communism, when everyone is equal and has equal rights, money etc, there shouldn't be a government at all. Which basically means everyone in the country should be part of the government or there isn't one at all. Which is what I don't understand, because if there's still people who are ultimately in charge (ie, govenrment) then not everyone is equal... meh confusing.

[rocketman089]

Which is why communism will never work, issy.