Serious The Politics Thread

[Chou Toshio]

seeing that 200 or so countries are operating under some form of free market right now, u should probably take the hint, unless all the academic consensus on this are just a big propaganda that fooled nearly every country in the world...kind of like the same logic no vaccine people use!

some socialist ideas are super cool tho, but they are way better off funded by tax money rather than some form of centrally planned economy that has never been pulled off successfully to the same extent the free market has done do

Having a Market =/= Capitalism

The idea of Market Socialism exists. The distinction lies in production being capital controlled vs labor controlled.

At a minimalist level, if we:
1) Give 60%+ of Board of Director seats and Board voter power to employee elected Reps at large Enterprises.
2) Expand democracy so that the citizenry can periodically craft and pass legislative packages that supersedes any Representative created legislation or executive power.
3) Decommodify necessities by expanding the set of state controlled services/industries we make public (on top of Primary Education, Defense, Fire fighting, policing, libraries, infrastructure, fundamental research, etc. that we already do, need to add key ones like education, affordable housing, basic food access, etc.)

If we do the above, that would count as a Socialist state in my book. It does require state regulation to maintain, but that’s not at all a difference in kind from the many many types of deeply invasive regulations needed to create/enforce a capitalist economic system.


The point is not to get rid of markets, but end the power of a small number of major corporation shareholders to govern all production, and ultimately the government as well.

Market Socialism means Governments AND corporations are fundamentally run democratically, and markets manage production of only commodities with elastic demand curves, not necessities with unbending inelastic demand (ie. don’t give control of insulin production/distribution to a market when demand side will literally pay any price or die).

And sorry comrades for being that dirty DemSoc who props up the turtle as the symbol of democratic progress— you know I never claimed otherwise.

 

[Fardin]

I don't think socialism or communism could work and I think that a free market isn't neccessarily bad, but the way it's done now is unsustainable in every meaning of the word and just doesn't work anymore for most of the population at this point. And even the definition "free market" is questionable when it's exclusively determined by Blackrock and associates and couple of rich people

i'm so glad you brought up Blackrock because it is one of the weirdest myth that has surfaced since a couple years ago, and it just shows the lack of understanding u hold on how those companies even operate. to put it in super simple terms, u can think of black rock as a bank thats holding deposits from its customers. But unlike a bank that can sort of treat that money as their own, blackrock and vanguard has super strict regulations on how that money can be spent. On top of this, like 80% of their 10 trillion dollar investment are index funds, which means they are just passive investments that they cannot randomly sell or buy shares from specific stocks. This essentially means that they have far less power than than what u think they do on any given company. they for sure has their influence and its a complicated topic, but its also a massively overblown one that gets brought up by people online a lot, because they just see 10 trillion dollar and automatically freak out

Feel free to lay out any actual problems that capitalism brings up that cannot be solved thru government intervention or etc, that is apparently unsustainable. It has been deemed "unsustainable" since the 1870s, with another new claim every 10-20 years or so, but the technological advancements along with many other factors related to capitalism has given us the best times humanity has ever since in its history

Who let the liberals back into this thread lmao.

Sorry I thought this was the politics thread. leftists at least in the USA are just the fringe minority who essentially hold 0 real world power within the government. It should not be surprising if u see a couple liberals criticizing ideas such as socialism

"Economists from western liberal capitalist countries who literally get paid to do western liberal capitalism say western liberal capitalism is the best system and socialists are stinky and dumb" is not the own you think it is, and all your posts actually show is a fundamental lack of understanding of both socialism and economics broadly.

it's not a big propaganda, but instead a field of science that operates on assumptions made hundreds of years ago that either were never proven or are unprovable, which exclusively rewards "scientists" that propagate the needs and wants of their sponsors

This is kind of fascinating to me icl. the oversimplification of this topic to basically ignore thousands of proper and unbias critic of socialism, with real world examples, all for the sake of riding the idea of 1 man who wasnt even an economist is beyond me

if u take a 4 year degree on this, the ideas u learn are 100% more favored thru markets (for good reasons ofc which u will not agree with), but the moment u go a bit deeper and look at the phd field, u will see a fuck ton actual critic of capitalism, with people trying to come up with solutions non stop. 95% of the critics socialist use about capitalism to overthrow the government has come from these economists. The difference is that these economists understand how ludicrous a centrally controlled market is, so they do not go to the complete opposite end of conspiracy theories, but they work within what they think is a better way going forward.

The level of conspiracy theory it takes to think every economist is just being manipulated by the system simple because they live in a capitalist countries is like the same idea as a flat earther telling me that most astronomer are only afraid to say the truth of the earth being flat is because they are running on hundreds of years of assumption, so there is no possible way they can even tell the truth for themselves, or that if they go against the grain, they will be looked down upon or etc.

like no, this is just an insult to the intelligence of the people studying this field who probably put 10000x more hours than you and me combined to know what is the best for the people. Socialism is just a terrible idea that no country would EVER touch, with or without US influence, for very good reasons.

Having a Market =/= Capitalism

The idea of Market Socialism exists. The distinction lies in production being capital controlled vs labor controlled.

At a minimalist level, if we:
1) Give 60%+ of Board of Director seats and Board voter power to employee elected Reps at large Enterprises.
2) Expand democracy so that the citizenry can periodically craft and pass legislative packages that supersedes any Representative created legislation or executive power.
3) Decommodify necessities by expanding the set of services state services/industries we make public (on top of Primary Education, Defense, Fire fighting, policing, libraries, infrastructure, fundamental research, etc. that we already do, need to add key ones like education, affordable housing, basic food access, etc.)

If we do the above, that would count as a Socialist state in my book. It does require state regulation to maintain, but that’s not at all a difference in kind from the many many types of deeply invasive regulations needed to create/enforce a capitalist economic system.


The point is not to get rid of markets, but end the power of a small number of major corporation shareholders to govern all production, and ultimately the government as well.

Market Socialism means Governments AND corporations are fundamentally run democratically, and markets manage production of only commodities with elastic demand curves, not necessities with unbending inelastic demand (ie. don’t give control of insulin control to a market when demand side will literally pay any price or die).

And sorry comrades for being that dirty DemSoc who props up the turtle as the symbol of democratic progress— you know I never claimed otherwise.

This is far more reasonable to me, and I dont necessarily disagree. my core issue with socialism has always been the centrally planned shit which is like the ultimate way to ruin any country ever. if there is an alternative way that can keep the markets and help more people, im much more open to it

a centrally planned economy is just one of the most thoroughly debunked theories, that its at the same level as thinking the earth is flat to me. i always love to see leftists defending this idea (but many of them will never talk about the specifics of it because they know that they can't defend it)

 

[Chou Toshio]

This is far more reasonable to me, and I dont necessarily disagree. my core issue with socialism has always been the centrally planned shit which is like the ultimate way to ruin any country ever. if there is an alternative way that can keep the markets and help more people, im much more open to it

a centrally planned economy is just one of the most thoroughly debunked theories, that its at the same level as thinking the earth is flat to me. i always love to see leftists defending this idea (but many of them will never talk about the specifics of it because they know that they can't defend it)

Glad to hear! The distinction above is that we already have a planned economy, with some industries being completely public (firefighting, military), some being public option (Primary School), and some being Market lead, with all 3 types and their various setups all just being tools with different strengths and weaknesses we pick from based on the model’s utility [to some group].

Capitalism means Capitalists are the group, and the major shareholders get to make all those important decisions for everyone. Yes, even the nationalized ones like military are nationalized because having it be so gives more utility to capital owners.

Socialism SHOULD mean that wider society gets to make those decisions for everyone.

See the actual definitions/distinctions are hidden in the plainly written names of these systems— a distinction not stemming from chosen economic models but purely based on who has power/control.

It’s possible that through democratic legislation a minimalist Market Socialist society would legislate more and more decommodification—

—but my personal view that markets are an effective model for production of unnecessary commodities and a destructive one for necessities, I think is a good distinction and starting point. That principle would be a starting point for initial decommodification.

Large enterprises needing to be worker controlled keeps the markets “in society’s control,” but we test our way to an effective cut-off line allowing startups and small business to use capital structure for the dynamism they may need to Innovate and get off the ground.

And finally truly robust democracy is needed to ensure that the industry we do nationalize is still in democratic control.

These 3 things: Decommidification of necessities, Worker Control of large enterprise, and robust democratic government, are the 3 essential legs a society would need to have in place at a minimum to be called “Socialist” imo.

 

[Fardin]

Glad to hear! The distinction above is that we already have a planned economy, with some industries being completely public (firefighting, military), some being public option (Primary School), and some being Market lead, with all 3 types and their various setups all just being tools that we pick from based on utility [to some group].

Yes but misleading af to say in the context of this convo, because they are maybe 30% fitting for the definition of "planned economy". All of them u mentioned hardcore rely on the rest of the economy being "free" market, because that brings in the most value, has the most efficiency, and therefor the most tax dollars. I'm all for socially funding some super important things like school, police, firefighting and etc, but they all rely on efficient markets to stay afloat and prosper, like how they have been compared to the rest of human history.

I just wanted to mention this cause i dont want some leftists thinking that ur supporting their core ideas. ur just basically talking about socdems, which i align with and support. thats the beauty of a liberal and capitalist state, its much more open to integrating ideas from other economic systems

Capitalism means Capitalists are the group, and the major shareholders get to make all those important decisions for everyone. Yes, even the nationalized ones like military are nationalized because having it be so gives more utility to capital owners.

Socialism SHOULD mean that wider society gets to make those decisions for everyone.

It’s possible that through democratic legislation a minimalist Market Socialist society would legislate more and more decommodification—

100% agree. Ignoring that second part of the last sentence about decommodification, we already have a TON of regulations to protect the consumers, with democratically controlled institutions (government). when im talking about capitalism vs socialism, i'm never gonna defend a 100% free market with minimal government interference and etc.

im very well aware of the failures of capitalism, and that u will need regulations and shit to keep it good for the people, i'm never gonna disagree with wat ur saying here. I don't consider what ur saying rn as anything close to socialism. its just some socialist ideas that are being entirely funded by the market. If that is not capitalism to u, im perfectly okay with that, as long as we understand that u need "free" markets either way. (remember that this is all in the context of socialism vs capitalism)

—but my personal view that markets are an effective model for production of unnecessary commodities and a destructive one for necessities, I think is a good distinction and starting point. That principle would be a starting point for initial decommodification.

Large enterprises needing to be worker controlled keeps the markets “in society’s control,” but we test our way to an effective cut-off line allowing startups and small business to use capital structure for the dynamism they may need to Innovate and get off the ground.

And finally truly robust democracy is needed to ensure that the industry we do nationalize is still in democratic control.

the whole concept of decommodification is i think getting too much value here, i highly doubt it will get the results u think that a simple legislation would not solve in its place, but this is still a better idea than throwing all markets away. Publically controlled necesisites like health care is already been done in the rest of the first world, im all for it.

idk what worker controlled large enterprises ever means cause people like to keep this idea as vague as possible for a reason. again like the idea might sound good and etc, but we really need to see some specifics because anytime stuff like these are brought up, they break the second u ask 1 or 2 nuance questions about the workplace. I'm open to it if they work and im aware there are some actual companies who are trying to attempt this working structure and are doing okayish, but this will stay a theory until there are some actual sturdy concepts

These 3 things: Decommidification of necessities, Worker Control of large enterprise, and robust democratic government, are the 3 essential legs a society would need to have in place at a minimum to be called “Socialist” imo.

ehhh, if we are being super honest, the second u try to claim that "free" markets should be the bread winner of society which then we use to fund heath care and etc, most leftist will end the convo there and just call u a soc dem (which u inadvertently had to apologize for in ur second last post cause u know how most feel about this). Its not really fair to call those 3 things u mentioned combined as socialism, but im aware people run on a LOT of different kind of definitions so im not gonna get hung up on it

I put far more emphasis on how the overall economy is actually ran and how the free market is utilized, because if u dont talk about this, or even attempt to argue against markets, calling ur current system as some form of Soc dem shit is 100% more appropriate. but im not hung up on the exact terms here cause they encompass a whole bunch of different ideas. as long as u and me both agree that we need markets to function, its fine with me

 

[Bakugames]

Anyways I enjoyed the adult conversation we were having before that guy interjected.

Its always funny how whenever theres a pretty interesting convo happening, some guy comes around to derail it into capitalist brainwashing 101. Being so adamant that the free market is a good thing and using capitalist economists of all things to explain it, while calling socialism a conspiracy theory is a new one, but its a funny kind of desperation to hold onto

 

[Chou Toshio]

Not Social Democrat, Democratic Socialist. Again the distinction is all about who they want in power— who gets to make the decisions.

A Social Democrat is someone who wants robust government programs and regulation, but still wants capitalists to control society.

A Democratic Socialist is someone who wants Society to democratically control EVERYTHING— with the state being most accountable to its people and any large private enterprise accountable to its workers.

In true democratic Market Socialism you can own stock in a company, but have very little to no control of what the company does— instead worker democracy makes the decisions of how a corporation operates. You can participate in democracy governance but can’t exercise any more political power than any other citizen, no matter how rich you are. This is ALL about WHO calls the shots.

idk what worker controlled large enterprises ever means cause people like to keep this idea as vague as possible for a reason. again like the idea might sound good and etc, but we really need to see some specifics because anytime stuff like these are brought up, they break the second u ask 1 or 2 nuance questions about the workplace. I'm open to it if they work and im aware there are some actual companies who are trying to attempt this working structure and are doing okayish, but this will stay a theory until there are some actual sturdy concepts

It’s not that hard, and will probably be choosing from different representative management models.

1st model: Government enforces that in any big business over half the seats in the board of directors are not elected by shareholders, but instead elected by workers. Majority vote determines all major decisions a Board of Directors would usually make, including hiring and firing executives.

2nd model: A worker coop. There’s lots of documentation on how these can be set up, but generally it’s just managers/executives being elected representatives of the workers, and the workers themselves being the board of directors.

ehhh, if we are being super honest, the second u try to claim that "free" markets should be the bread winner of society which then we use to fund heath care and etc, most leftist will end the convo there and just call u a soc dem (which u inadvertently had to apologize for in ur second last post cause u know how most feel about this). Its not really fair to call those 3 things u mentioned combined as socialism, but im aware people run on a LOT of different kind of definitions so im not gonna get hung up on it

I put far more emphasis on how the overall economy is actually ran and how the free market is utilized, because if u dont talk about this, or even attempt to argue against markets, calling ur current system as some form of Soc dem shit is 100% more appropriate. but im not hung up on the exact terms here cause they encompass a whole bunch of different ideas. as long as u and me both agree that we need markets to function, its fine with me

Again the distinctions are all about WHO has control, and making sure that either private sector or public sector, the system is built and designed and managed with democracy at the helm, not capital ownership.

Also you notice I’m purposefully avoiding the phrase “free market” because there’s no such thing as a “free market”. Market contours are always defined by a government, by a monopoly of force— there’s only different kinds of markets, with rules established to govern them; those rules made for the benefit of some specified group. We have a market crafted to suit capital owners. We used to have markets crafted for monarchy controlled enterprises. We could definitely create markets designed to benefit workers or larger citizenry— and all versions of said markets would be equally “free.”

Or perhaps, it would be better to think of a market designed with laws that grants more people more freedom in their lives to be more free.

 

[Bakugames]

My issues with demsocs is that a lot of them are still held by imperialism. It's my complaint from earlier pages: socdems have no concept of dismantling the current hegemony that enriches the global north at the expense of the global south, they just change where those riches are distributed in their own country. This means that a socdem world would still be an imperialistic world. Its an ideology which only serves to jump people into something like proper communism

 

[Divine Retribution]

I don't necessarily think degrowth is actually incompatible with market socialism or demsoc-style economic systems at least in theory, although I do agree that the majority of demsocs especially in the west are more interested in a fairer society domestically and tend not to think about things through an international or anti-colonialist lens. I've definitely been guilty of that myself, and am currently in the ongoing process of learning more about degrowth and anti-colonialism and trying to get a better perspective on what an international revolution would actually look like in practice.


Call me naive or utopian or whatever but I still do beleive it's possible to do without much violence (or at least without violence between the proletariat of privileged global north countries and rising socialist movements in the global south; some amount of violent crackdown from the bourgeiosie is inevitable as their grip on the empire slips regardless of who it is making that happen). If bananas and chocolate become unaffordable but in exchange workers in the global south don't have to endure de facto slavery and can reclaim their autonomy and begin rebuilding their dignity that's a small price to pay. If technology gets more expensive because we aren't tearing apart the Earth for rare earth elements and poisoning people's land in exchange for none of the profits, so be it.

 

[Chou Toshio]

My issues with demsocs is that a lot of them are still held by imperialism. It's my complaint from earlier pages: socdems have no concept of dismantling the current hegemony that enriches the global north at the expense of the global south, they just change where those riches are distributed in their own country. This means that a socdem world would still be an imperialistic world. Its an ideology which only serves to jump people into something like proper communism

^ Totally fair, and you’re probably right about a lot there. But again— we don’t know what’s ultimately right.

I personally think you’d need mine to be a widely held view before there could be anywhere near enough hands and minds to make a meaningful Revolution possible.

If you don’t even have a significant population understanding what Socialism is, the distinction I’ve outlined above, then you certainly won’t have enough people who think it’s worth fighting for. They don’t even think it’s worth voting for yet.

 

[Bakugames]

when im in a "move to the right" competition and my opponent is the american dems

 

[Fardin]

Its always funny how whenever theres a pretty interesting convo happening, some guy comes around to derail it into capitalist brainwashing 101. Being so adamant that the free market is a good thing and using capitalist economists of all things to explain it, while calling socialism a conspiracy theory is a new one, but its a funny kind of desperation to hold onto

not sure what to say here, there is a reason u didnt respond to any of the points in my reply to ur initial comments. if u have nothing meaningful to say and can't engage with the points, no need to flood the thread by crying that the topic is not about something you want to talk about. You are always free to ignore my points + my reply to ur own posts regarding the topic and just continue the other discussion

A Democratic Socialist is someone who wants Society to democratically control EVERYTHING— with the state being most accountable to its people and any large private enterprise accountable to its workers.

In true democratic Market Socialism you can own stock in a company, but have very little to no control of what the company does— instead worker democracy makes the decisions of how a corporation operates. You can participate in democracy governance but can’t exercise any more political power than any other citizen, no matter how rich you are. This is ALL about WHO calls the shots.

ugh i think i understand it better now, but now it also sounds like as bad as other socialist definitions lol

basically all the positives of a market with all the socialist weirdness introduced by giving every worker regardless of their investment in the company an equal voice, which already has billions of critics against it. I really don't wanna flood the thread with this more than necessary. its basically just capitalism with a different name cause u just change the decision making power to the more uninformed workers. just changing the decision making will not influence the core incentive of the company (W for capitalism and a profit driven system). ur introducing 100x different ways for the company to fail for a bit better working conditions for the people if does end up doing okay for that 1 odd company. this is just soc dem on steroids

im not super interested in talking about this specific thing in this thread cause its not really the "socialism" i have a problem with the most, but feel free to send me a msg and we can continue there if u want

My issues with demsocs is that a lot of them are still held by imperialism. It's my complaint from earlier pages: socdems have no concept of dismantling the current hegemony that enriches the global north at the expense of the global south, they just change where those riches are distributed in their own country. This means that a socdem world would still be an imperialistic world. Its an ideology which only serves to jump people into something like proper communism

this is a common cope, but the reality is that, just because people are not throwing out solutions such as a mass revolution that could implicate hundreds of millions of people into an arguably way worse life, with ideas that have been disputed by the entire world with hundreds of books and papers, it does not mean the other side does not care about these things

nobody can wave a magic wand and immediately fix the exploitations. the only difference here is that i am more pragmatic than u, and realize the reality of the situation and try to work within the existing system. just cause u are advocating for a completely unfounded and radical new ideology and system, it means absolutely 0 in the real world. ur ideas do not work, the end result of the ideas u dream about are the only thing u have that makes u think ur doing the right thing

purely running on hope that this clearly flawed system u advocate for will fix the world, and thinking ur actually doing more than liberals who actually DO try to make change in the real world with the existing capitalist system is what i personally dislike the most about leftists

all this revolution thru violence is abhorrent af to me, especially when a few socialists i talk to cant even tell me how a workplace would look like if i just ask a couple nuanced questions to them. these insane ideas need to stay purely on the internet cause its as dangerous and radical as the people on the far right

 

[Chou Toshio]

ugh i think i understand it better now, but now it also sounds like as bad as other socialist definitions lol

basically all the positives of a market with all the socialist weirdness introduced by giving every worker regardless of their investment in the company an equal voice, which already has billions of critics against it. I really don't wanna flood the thread with this more than necessary. its basically just capitalism with a different name cause u just change the decision making power to the more uninformed workers. just changing the decision making will not influence the core incentive of the company (W for capitalism and a profit driven system). ur introducing 100x different ways for the company to fail for a bit better working conditions for the people if does end up doing okay for that 1 odd company. this is just soc dem on steroids

im not super interested in talking about this specific thing in this thread cause its not really the "socialism" i have a problem with the most, but feel free to send me a msg and we can continue there if u want

If you don’t get the importance of this distinction then you won’t understand at all what Socialism or different Marxisms are.

You said that more radical communists would decry my ideas but read the arguments— they’re arguing with me on tactics, and on the timeline to become more globally inclusive of human needs, they’re not arguing with me about what socialism is or whether or not my minimalist socialism is socialism—

—because they know that “WHO has power” IS what’s at the core of Socialism broadly, and DEFINITELY for Marx. THAT is the WHOLE issue, not planned vs unplanned, nationalized, markets or not, whatever. WHO the system works for IS the line between CAPITALism and SOCIALism, or COMMUN(ity)ism— who has power, who is it designed to work for.

If you already agree with Liberal Democracy then you’re already halfway bought into the arguments of Socialism.

When we say, “Democracy is the worst system except for all the others” we’re getting at the core fact behind Socialism— the people may be more stupid, but STILL better them than a king. The king doesn’t care at all about them. The people may be dumb, but only by taking the power into their own hands can they be free— and that goes just as much for enterprise as governance.

You can call the people stupid, but global utopian communism exists at your feet, right now. There are many species of ants that already have world peace between unrelated colonies that have all banded together to form global super colonies that don’t war. What were species of viciously individualistic and inter-colony violent organisms have already attained world peace.

And all the production, the construction, the management of resources and systems of sewage, childcare, agriculture, husbandry, food production, defense, etc etc etc—

All of it ants accomplish with brains infinitely inferior to ours, managed solely by endless tweeting and twitter polling by [really stupid] individuals. It’s rapid democracy and voting-by-pheromones producing group wisdom decision making that makes it all possible.

Until recently humanity had no way of reproducing that kind of mass polling and decision making, it would have been impossible in any proceeding technical era.

But now— that’s no longer the case.

If we wanted it bad enough, if we were able to evolve hearts and minds and culture enough, we could make it happen. We have more than enough technology, productivity, intelligence to do so— it’s just a matter of if we want it.

That changing of hearts and minds and culture is the core, the essential root of it. And it’s gonna take time to reach— a slow bend of the moral arc towards justice. These are my reasons for believing specifically in Democratic Socialism.

 

[Chou Toshio]

View attachment 677603

when im in a "move to the right" competition and my opponent is the american dems

OMG how does she get more cringe by the second…

 

[Fardin]

If you don’t get the importance of this distinction then you won’t understand at all what Socialism or different Marxisms are.

You said that more radical communists would decry my ideas but read the arguments— they’re arguing with me on tactics, and on the timeline to become more globally inclusive of human needs, they’re not arguing with me about what socialism is or whether or not my minimalist socialism is socialism—

—because they know that “WHO has power” IS what’s at the core of Socialism broadly, and DEFINITELY for Marx. THAT is the WHOLE issue, not planned vs unplanned, nationalized, markets or not, whatever. WHO the system works for IS the line between CAPITALism and SOCIALism, or COMMUN(ity)ism— who has power, who is it designed to work for.

If you already agree with Liberal Democracy then you’re already halfway bought into the arguments of Socialism.

When we say, “Democracy is the worst system except for all the others” we’re getting at the core fact behind Socialism— the people may be more stupid, but STILL better them than a king. The king doesn’t care at all about them. The people may be dumb, but only by taking the power into their own hands can they be free— and that goes just as much for enterprise as governance.

You can call the people stupid, but global utopian communism exists at your feet, right now. There are many species of ants that already have world peace between unrelated colonies that have all banded together to form global super colonies that don’t war. What were species of viciously individualistic and inter-colony violent organisms have already attained world peace.

And all the production, the construction, the management of resources and systems of sewage, childcare, agriculture, husbandry, food production, defense, etc etc etc—

All of it ants accomplish with brains infinitely inferior to ours, managed solely by endless tweeting and twitter polling by individuals. It’s rapid democracy and voting-by-pheromones producing group wisdom decision making makes it all possible.

Until recently humanity had no way of reproducing that kind of mass polling and decision making, it would have been impossible in any proceeding technical era.

But now— that’s no longer the case.

If we wanted it bad enough, if we were able to evolve hearts and minds and culture enough, we could make it happen. We have more than enough technology, productivity, intelligence to do so— it’s just a matter if we want it.

That changing of hearts and minds and culture is the core, the essential root of it. And it’s gonna take time to reach— a slow bend of the moral arc towards justice. These are my reasons for believing specifically in Democratic Socialism.

lol, yes im aware with the vague platitudes behind socialist ideas, im more concerned with pragmatic side of the argument and talking about mainstream ideas that most leftist people get behind. I could not care less about this vague post

give me results, concrete ideas, real world examples. socialism sounds amazing to every human on earth, until u put their ideas to test and see it fail time and time again. i could not care LESS about the world salad u just typed out. we can try to sway people's "hearts and minds and culture" for a society where everyone is more equal and bla bla bla, but i would rather first look at the idea socialist preach before doing all that, and see if its even worth it.

I could copy and paste ur msg rn behind any ludicrous idea that just preaches some great end result for everyone, i would treat it the same way

 

[Bakugames]

OMG how does she get more cringe by the second…

This election was in the bag and she keeps fumbling it so bad... who are her advisors cuz she needs to fire them asap

 

[Chou Toshio]

lol, yes im aware with the vague platitudes behind socialist ideas, im more concerned with pragmatic side of the argument and talking about mainstream ideas that most leftist people get behind. I could not care less about the weird definitions of WHO controls the system or what constitutes socialist ideas or etc and etc.

give me results, concrete ideas, real world examples. socialism sounds amazing to every human on earth, until u put their ideas to test and see it fail time and time again. i could not care LESS about the world salad u just typed out. we can try to sway people's "hearts and minds and culture" for a society where everyone is more equal and bla bla bla, but i would rather first look at the idea socialist preach before doing all that, and see if its even worth it.

I could copy and paste ur msg rn behind any ludicrous idea that just preaches some great end result for everyone, i would treat it the same way

Okay then— here’s a practical piece of Socialists’ success: Before Bernie ran, the idea of Democratic Socialism was completely unheard of by Americans, was completely taboo. Now AoC and the squad can go on mainstream media any time and be welcomed as rational and respected political figures.

Before we started this conversation, you thought socialist ideas were entirely stupid and impractical. Now you’re saying we should put them to the test. That’s a win in my book. You understand what it is, and why Socialists see a substantive line between DemSoc and SocDem.

These are baby steps, but if enough such steps are taken, maybe a future Democratic Congress will look at a program for government loans to allow workers to buy retiring businesses to turn into worker coops. Maybe the Democrats continue to make domestic conditions where Unions grow to even greater political power. Maybe DSA gets enough members for their endorsements to start meaning something to Democrats.

Again, I’m a DEMOCRATIC Socialist.
(Seriously Smogon, no Turtle Pokemon emojis? Where’s Squirtle?)

Edit: Also can I just say, that SocDems are trash, and literally every Social Democratic accomplishment was accomplished by Democratic Socialists who fell short of what they wanted— like Warren in 2020, SocDems are just whipping boys of the man. Even under Biden, Build Back Better came from the influence of Chairman Bernie, not Warren.

 

[Chou Toshio]

This election was in the bag and she keeps fumbling it so bad... who are her advisors cuz she needs to fire them asap

She’s getting advice from Hillary apparently. Strap yourself in all… god damn liberals…

 

[SittinGamer]

This election was in the bag and she keeps fumbling it so bad... who are her advisors cuz she needs to fire them asap

Word on the street which is to say unfounded I think would be that they're grabbing Hillary/Obama advisors and we all know how well one of those two worked out. I remember when they were calling the republicans weird and they were malding but i guess we cant let even an ounce of respectability politics slip for longer than like two weeks.

 

[donphan fan]

View attachment 677603

when im in a "move to the right" competition and my opponent is the american dems

This is terrible to see. With less than a month to go she is completely going against her original campaign. It feels so different than what we saw just a month ago. Who is even going to believe she will do this that will vote for her this late?

I also think we should just ignore the "Tournament Banned" person... I don't know what they did to get banned but it is hard to take them seriously if we know they break the rules.

 

[Fardin]

I also think we should just ignore the "Tournament Banned" person... I don't know what they did to get banned but it is hard to take them seriously if we know they break the rules.

as long as we both know the line of logic to believe socialism works is identical to people believing in flat earth, vaccines being fake or the illuminati.

i didnt expect any actual rebuttals in the first place (the only coherent response being from a dude who believes in markets), i was just interested in how this place of the site looks like :) one day ur gonna have to defend ur ideas in the real world if socialism ever kicks off, its not gonna be a fun time for u guys i promise

good talk comrades!

 

[juoean]

there is not rly even one "idea of socialism" and in fact in the last page of this thread you can see several different 'versions' of 'socialism' being brought up, in response to fardin's posts, including ones that explicitly disagree with each other as in the above exchange between bakugames and chou

i tune out of highly ideological discussions very quickly so im not rly going to get involved in that but i do want to say that "advocating socialism is the same as advocating antivax and climate change" is nonsense for the simple reason that the fascist movement that includes antivax and climate change denial is an actually existing material force in the world that wages violence against millions of people, while random leftists debating about concept(s) of socialism online does not have such a correspondence. (ig excluding someone who claims that north korea or wherever is an example of socialism but obv no one here is doing that and 99.99% of "discussions abt socialism" are not doing that)

ideologies can only be "measured" in the material forces they correspond to, and people 'promoting the idea of socialism' clearly are not connected to any violence that comes anywhere remotely close to the violence that the forces of antivax and climate change denial carry out day to day.

(or u know u could just express disagreement with [whatever it is u think u are disagreeing with since i rly dont even know what the word "socialism" means half the time anymore when its used in 500 different ways] without engaging in wild and inflammatory comparisons)

btw chou u can get any pokemon sprite by typing : squirtle : without the spaces.

 

[Fardin]

there is not rly even one "idea of socialism" and in fact in the last page of this thread you can see several different 'versions' of 'socialism' being brought up, in response to fardin's posts, including ones that explicitly disagree with each other as in the above exchange between bakugames and chou

i tune out of highly ideological discussions very quickly so im not rly going to get involved in that but i do want to say that "advocating socialism is the same as advocating antivax and climate change" is nonsense for the simple reason that the fascist movement that includes antivax and climate change denial is an actually existing material force in the world that wages violence against millions of people, while random leftists debating about concept(s) of socialism online does not have such a correspondence. (ig excluding someone who claims that north korea or wherever is an example of socialism but obv no one here is doing that and 99.99% of "discussions abt socialism" are not doing that)

ideologies can only be "measured" in the material forces they correspond to, and people 'promoting the idea of socialism' clearly are not connected to any violence that comes anywhere remotely close to the violence that the forces of antivax and climate change denial carry out day to day.

(or u know u could just express disagreement with [whatever it is u think u are disagreeing with since i rly dont even know what the word "socialism" means half the time anymore when its used in 500 different ways] without engaging in wild and inflammatory comparisons)

btw chou u can get any pokemon sprite by typing : squirtle : without the spaces.

i agree but that is exactly why I said line of logic. the thought process to ignore an entire academic field as being bias, bought and paid for or etc, ignoring a mountain of evidence, research papers that deeply dive into the failures of most socialist countries, the blatant ignorance of facts surrounding the topics, and only looking for evidence that supports UR theory

there are a lot of steps for someone end up becoming a socialist, and even if its done out of just ignorance or lack of information, the thought process behind it all is nearly identical to stuff like flat earth shit or anti vax stuff where they cherry pick evidences from dumb doctors with oversimplified version of all the facts

but yes, overall being an anti vaxxer and etc is far far more damaging in the real world cause its a much easier thing to be bought in for, and it causes real material harm, unlike socialism (at least until this supposed violent revolution happens )

(its also scary to see no one calling out their bs, as if socialism is not this insanely fringe widely disputed economic system, but some pockets of the internet are highly idealistic aligned to some extreme shit so ig it is what it is)

 

[tada]

as long as we both know the line of logic to believe socialism works is identical to people believing in flat earth, vaccines being fake or the illuminati.

i didnt expect any actual rebuttals in the first place (the only coherent response being from a dude who believes in markets), i was just interested in how this place of the site looks like :) one day ur gonna have to defend ur ideas in the real world if socialism ever kicks off, its not gonna be a fun time for u guys i promise

good talk comrades!

People gave you a rebuttal plenty of times, you just said they were bullshit and moved on. that's why I said in a deleted post that you're arguing in bad faith then and you continue to do so now. If socialism didn't work the west wouldn't invade every country with a leader that tried to implement socialist polices. they see that as a threat to western hegemony (slavery) and cannot under any means let the slaves revolt. The slaves in the USA are slowly waking up but I fear by the time they all do it'll be too late to change anything and we'll be stuck with the hell hole they've wanted for us all a long while they hover above us in their flashy space colony in the sky.

 

[adjectivenoun]

View attachment 677603

when im in a "move to the right" competition and my opponent is the american dems

What a terrible move. How are you going to go back to the whole "reach across the isle" thing after picking Walz as your VP, after leaning so much into the whole "Republicans are weird" schtick, after rightfully calling out the opposing party as dangerous for months? I had no illusions about where Biden's VP would ultimately be politically, but I figured she would at least keep up the progressive front long enough to win the damn election! I guess it's really hard to take the losing out of the Democrats.

 

[juoean]

i agree but that is exactly why I said line of logic. the thought process to ignore an entire academic field as being bias, bought and paid for or etc, ignoring a mountain of evidence, research papers that deeply dive into the failures of most socialist countries, the blatant ignorance of facts surrounding the topics, and only looking for evidence that supports UR theory

there are a lot of steps for someone end up becoming a socialist, and even if its done out of just ignorance or lack of information, the thought process behind it all is nearly identical to stuff like flat earth shit or anti vax stuff where they cherry pick evidences from dumb doctors with oversimplified version of all the facts

but yes, overall being an anti vaxxer and etc is far far more damaging in the real world cause its a much easier thing to be bought in for, and it causes real material harm, unlike socialism (at least until this supposed violent revolution happens )

(its also scary to see no one calling out their bs, as if socialism is not this insanely fringe widely disputed economic system, but some pockets of the internet are highly idealistic aligned to some extreme shit so ig it is what it is)

yea i mean i rly dont even know what u are talking about here, what does "thought process" mean for the 500 different things that are all potentially grouped under "socialism" depending on who u ask.
i dont even know which academic field you are referring to here, or who it is that is engaging in ignoring evidence and cherrypicking like are you talking about something that someone in this thread said, something u encountered somewhere else.

if theres anyone ignoring facts and ignoring entire fields here i think its you, because you are making sweeping generalizations about one of the most imprecise terms in political discourse today. the 500 different "versions" of what people mean by the word socialism have virtually nothing in common with each other for it even to be meaningful to criticize them all grouped together.

i think some of the responses to you over the past 1.5 pages have tried to get into the details a bit more but its very difficult to do when u make these sort of sweeping statements that it is honestly hard to even figure out what u are talking about.

eg u bring up "violent revolution", when that is neither exclusive to "socialism" nor universal across "versions" of socialism.
i think it is absurd to think that imperialist violence will magically vanish by itself, and i absolutely support the right of colonized people to self-determination and to resist colonialism and genocide by whatever means including violent ones, but none of this necessarily has anything to do with "socialism". there are plenty of "socialists" who are also islamophobes or otherwise do not stand by the palestinian resistance, and plenty of people who defend the palestinian resistance who do not consider themselves socialists. (since "socialism" has so many different meanings nowadays and u have not at any point identified a specific meaning or set of meanings of "socialism" that u are discussing, so idk how to evaluate whether u would consider someone socialist so im j going off whether ppl "identify" as socialist). there are literally sections of genocidal zionism that claim to be "socialist", that is how diverse the uses of the term are.

jsyk i may not engage with this convo much further, but ig as a concluding comment id encourage you to address more concretely and precisely what it is u are criticizing or disagreeing with, bc "socialism" j feels like a buzzword in your posts u might as well be saying "critical race theory" to me bc i cant make heads of tails of what u are actually criticizing bc u dont provide any specificity and it all relates back to this very nebulous term


edit: one other sidenote, i would in general suggest that no political ideology rly represents or reflects any particular "thought process", people may share the same or extremely similar political ideologies while still having very different 'thought processes'. kinda the nature of politics that people group together from a range of subjectivities to organize around something in common