(Dec 22, 2020 at 11:57 PM)Spritanium Wrote: I'm concerned about the examples you've used in your argument. Building roads, providing unemployment checks, and healthcare are all things a capitalist country CAN do if it feels like regulating capitalism. The mantra of the economic system itself is to maximize profits, so already we can see a divide between the priorities of capitalism and the priorities of good people. This is a system that can only work if it is restrained, i.e. disallowed from fully accomplishing what it's meant to doRight, a country that is simply capitalist would have no healthcare, and a country that is simply communist would have the best healthcare possible. So no country that has ever existed has been capitalist or communist. They're ideas. The idea of communism according to my dictionary is "a political theory derived from Karl Marx, advocating class war and leading to a society in which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs." I'm sure someone will throw a shit fit over that definition because it's written by the bourgeoisie in Big Dictionary, but it's serviceable. A political system where the government owns everything and allocates resources to people as needed sounds workable. It seems to solve poverty, as resources would be divided equally. But is this the one sole way to make sure everyone can eat? Countries that we call capitalist still have welfare programs - an idea that is inherently anti-capitalist and seems to solve the same problem that communism would, in theory.
Meanwhile, those same things are all things a communist country would be doing by default, with no restraint required. The economy would be planned to make sure people have access to these things. If it fails at doing so that's another issue entirely, but I would take a government that fails in an honest shot to provide, over a government that succeeds at trying no such thing
The term capitalist was also coined by Karl Marx when he wasn't busy praising the US for taking California from the "lazy Mexicans" or writing on how to solve "the Jewish problem." The modern meaning of the terms, and the idea that a country is either capitalist or communist, are a rhetorical tactic meant to coerce his readers into following his beliefs. That's not uncommon in persuasive writing, but it's a little dishonest and doesn't have much place in a conversation. No country on Earth was created as a "capitalist country" and none mention capitalism in their constitutional documents. Like you said, countries referred to as capitalist have laws that inherently suppress capitalism. If these countries can regulate the pursuit of profit at all, surely they can continue to do so until the problems are solved. Where a minimum wage exists, it can be raised; where taxes exist, they can prevent ludicrous wealth inequality.
Quote:Then we get to slaughtering citizens in droves, which has nothing to do with any economic system on earth, except perhaps capitalism which requires the implicit threat of death in order to function. I don't want anyone to die at all, but is slaughtering someone because they dissented from collectivist thought really worse than letting somebody die because they dared catch an illness? I think it's a wash; both of these things are awful to do. The difference is only one of these things is a natural result of the economic system it takes place within. Slaughter of citizens is not required by communism in theory. Letting unprofitable citizens die to make an example out of "lazy" people is more or less required by capitalism at a fundamental levelRight, if a country existed solely to propagate capitalist ideals it would murder the sick in the streets to remind their slave class to stay healthy and profitable. But no such country exists and no country wants to become that.
Quote:I would rather trend toward communism, a theory that revolves around collective ownership, than toward capitalism, a theory that is all-encompassing, injects itself into every facet of our lives, and has the potential to kill the shit out of you whether or not you decided to play by its rulesI think every country has been trending left (toward communism) for hundreds of years. Businesses are regulated and become more regulated. Government finds new ways to support the sick and poor. Health care systems come into play and are improved as new issues arise. A capitalist country would not do any of those things. I don't think they're trending to communism because I don't think that kind of country can function in the 21st century. Maybe after we're all dead they'll get there. Progress moves ever toward things getting better.
Of course, it's slow. It's frustratingly slow, and I can see why people think they'd be better off burning the whole thing down and running it themselves. But no one in history has ever overthrown a government and then started a great one from scratch, and I think it's inherently impossible for that to happen, especially now when a machine gun attached to a toy helicopter can fly up to a terrorist's bedroom window if he ever actually gets an army together. And like I said earlier, the people who are capable of razing a system of government are never going to be the ones that should run one. We've seen it a million times before. If you believe that money is a corrupting influence I think you'd reason that a fully armed private militia is pretty corrupting too.
My bottom line is not that the idea of communism is terrible, just that we can't live in an idea. It seems very appealing when you've spent your experiencing the failings of so-called capitalism. We know Ayn Rand famously moved out of a communist country and believed unregulated free market capitalism was the only path to success; it's easy to see the failings of your own system and imagine how much better the "alternative" would be. But no one has ever lived in a capitalist or communist country and I sincerely doubt anyone alive will. After we're dead, maybe. Right now, though, we have elections and academics who advise politicians and activists who coerce voters and that's worked a lot better than communism ever has. It could work better, of course, but the practical way to make it work better is to support it moving in the right direction. Tyrants and rich assholes thrive on arguments about why Marx knew everything and we need to get rid of the government. It gets voters to think "both sides are bad" and either remove themselves from the effective forms of enacting change or become polarized away from ideas like health care and welfare, unemployment cheques. It's the best possible endorsement of the right, and I would rather literally eat shit then endorse the right.
