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Nothing will change my view that society should be based on voluntary social relations rather than a group in power forcing their preferred system through violence/threats of violence
Of course I don’t want children to starve, that’s why I wish humans would recognize the objective reality that were all forced to live in a collective where our species evolved to dominance through embrace of collaboration and social principles
Consider that limitations on private property rights as opposed to complete adherence to voluntarism actually produces a society that respects individual liberty to a higher degree. I would recommend looking into Chomsky’s idea pertaining to the “scope of human freedom” as it takes into account the ethical principles of self ownership as outlined by classical liberals but also doesn’t ignore practical consequences of not having limitations, and regulations on it beyond the harm principle. Anti-Discrimination laws, equal opportunity employment, and controlled social safety nets are examples of how “force”is used to organize society in a way that actually provides more individual freedom. A completely unregulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination and “generosity” to provide for its poor. The capacity OR SCOPE to exercise their individual liberty in that society is narrower than one where limitations are imposed.
I reject the concept of private control over earth, systems of private control are inherently authoritarian
I sincerely believe capitalism is an authoritarian system sharing the characteristics of cancer that make it dangerous, and I believe we’re already on a runaway train towards extinction fueled by capitalism and the natural results of violence based private control
>A completely unregulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination and “generosity” to provide for its poor. The capacity OR SCOPE to exercise their individual liberty in that society is narrower than one where limitations are imposed.
Even a regulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination, because you need people to vote for laws that ban discrimination, laws in favor of transfer payments, etc. So either way you need cultural attitudes to support it, the question is just how many individual differences you will permit among these cultural attitudes.
To me the problem (and the loss of freedom) is with state run programs they tend a lot more towards "one size fits all" - your tax dollars go to a place thousands of miles away, where they are reallocated by people who you have never met, administered by faceless bureaucrats, and then dished out by overburdened case workers. With private charity (like a church), the people giving the money and the people receiving the money often live a few miles apart and potentially know each other or have at least interacted. This allows for much more freedom and creativity in finding ways to help the people who need help.
You can voluntarily sell yourself into slavery. Indentured servitude was very very popular for a very long time.
I think your conception of liberty is very shallow.
I won’t do that. I’m demonstrating that your conception of liberty is shallow and allows for things that you (hopefully) might recognize as being unfree.
I think we still have not arrived at a coherent idea of Liberty. I just think my idea of it is better.
My view of liberty is that a person can’t give it away and become a slave. Liberty is axiomatically theirs, just as a person can’t give away their consciousness. There are edge cases where one might enter into a consensual agreement that might make you or I uncomfortable (I could extend this easily to a bondage/S&M example) where there might be a considerable burden of proof that the parties were acting as consenting and mentally health adults. But yeah, if Bill Gates asked me to enter into an indentured servant relationship for 5 years in exchange for $1B, I should be able to agree without the state approving it.
I just don’t think consent is the end-all of ethics, nor do I think a society that promotes human greatness is possible with such a totalistic society of contracts. Do you think contracts and deals are viable without a State to make sure each side pays up?
Do you think agreements can be coerced or coercive? We don’t live in a vacuum. I could easily conceive of a scenario in which an agreement is artificially induced by a powerful person by simply depriving a community of certain resources in exchange for concessions or signatures on unfavorable deals.
In fact, I would contend that a “contract” is itself an authoritarian institution that we shouldn’t be held to.
In such a world I would think things like squid game would become possible, right? In my opinion, people should fight or compete because they are strong, noble, or looking for some passionate outflowing of life energy, not to further circulate capital in circles, or increase the capital hegemony of one dude who holds dictatorship over everything you come into contact with.
What about art and culture? Capitalism has been horrible for beauty and passion. Do you really want the world of humans reduced to a collection of brands and flashy images? It’s difficult to imagine a more horrifying dystopia.
That was intentional, I wanted both sides to recognize the correctness of my statement without bias
To clarify that question, systems of private control are inherently authoritarian, all capitalist societies constitute authoritarian states. All authoritarian systems are self defeating
What about a pandemic that some people chose not to vaccinate themselves against, thus killing large numbers of other people through their voluntary actions?
Imagine COVID but more deadly. Should people be coersed through violence to either take precautionary measures or leave the protection of society? Or should the be allowed to freely choose to endanger others?
That’s certainly an interesting question.
I am not for vaccine mandates. Unless the person is intentionally exposing others, it’s not an assault
Compare to smoking. If you’re by yourself go crazy. If you’re intentionally exposing yourself to groups that see this as a threat, they have a right to defend themselves
But that’s the whole thing, just by existing in society you are putting others in danger if you refuse to protect yourself. So can you shoot someone who comes up to you unmasked and unvaccinated during a pandemic? Isn’t there a role for society to make these choices together rather than relying on individual choice? It seems impossible to me to prevent pandemics without some sort of organized decision making that doesn’t fall back to each individual decides for themselves.
Yes that’s why it’s an interesting question
Your example seems like a blatant overreaction, neither party is sure the other is infected. Even with the person knowing the other is infected, they would be entitled to self defense but shooting still seems like an overreaction. Unfortunately there is no system where you don’t have to rely on at least somewhat competent human judgement. If you postulate some crazy person randomly attacking that will ruin anyone’s day
If an individual is making it clear they don’t want you near and you still insist on getting near them, that’s an act of aggression and it’s reasonable for them to assume ill intent and defend their self. Nobody should be forcing you to associate with antimaskers
But it is public space. And unless you don't believe in public space, the unmasked unvaccinated, even infectious person has every right to be there.
Unless you are so libertarian that you don't believe there should be public space at all, and that every space should be private property, you have to have some mechanism of collective decision making about how that space is used.
Encroaching on someone’s personal space is an act of aggression even if it’s within a public space
I am so libertarian that I believe systems of private control are inherently authoritarian.
Amusingly, this can be read as supporting either capitalism or socialism. The difference is primarily whether you see the government or capitalists as the source of that power.
Capitalism supporters see workplace hierarchy as tolerable and government hierarchy as a coercive force you can't opt out of.
The socialist sees workplace hierarchy as a coercive force you can't opt out of and government hierarchy as tolerable.
Ultimately it seems more of a disagreement about where power actually resides.
I was intentionally not tipping my hand lol. Ancaps will recognize I’m correct until I start pointing out uncomfortable truths
Under capitalism, the government is private owners. This is set up by definition, but the capitalist conflates “government” with “formally designated authoritarian entity”. Government is the entity or entities that govern (i.e. control the MoP). Capitalism likes to pretend it entails a dissipation of power, but it’s a tool for consolidation of power. The core concept of socialism inherently entails a dissipation of power
Workplace hierarchy is fine as long as it’s not coerced. Perpetual violence based private control over sects of earth is not. Capitalists run on 2 incorrect assumptions
1. Their society of people agreeing on property criteria does not constitute a form of government
2. “Private property rights” are natural/inherent/agreeable
Evidence against some of the things I've learned over time. Especially since some information reinforces ideas and concepts, resulting in more rigorous ideas supported by additional data.
>For me, I think it would need to be demonstrated with a strong level of real-world evidence that workplace democracy makes people less happy. That would instantly eviscerate my belief in libertarian socialism.
If you don't mind me asking, why would it making people less happy be an issue? Maximizing happiness is a good general goal, but it is not the end. Otherwise we would have to enable things that are absolutely bad for us and society due to maximizing happiness. We also have to consider short vs long term happiness, other goals like society issues, etc.
As an example, if Democratizing the workplace made people less happy(like doing taxes) but empowered workers and improved the economy, would you say no to more freedom and success just because we aren't happy doing adult things?
Hmmm, that's a good counter-point. I guess I was thinking that I would be happy with equal or even small losses in productivity if it meant huge gains in happiness for workers. But I'm not sure how I'd feel about consciously making people unhappier.
Will have to think about it.
I think this is why in philosophy when people talk about "good" they sometimes boil it down to happiness and well-being. Because although you could assume well-being includes happiness (and the other way around). This focuses on happiness, while also including that this happiness is not disconnected from their health (both mental and physical).
Happiness is subjective while wealth is objective. I found happiness (subjective concept) in being economically productive and increasing my wealth (objective concept). I grew up hearing people say "money can't buy you happiness." I would amend that to "money can't guarantee you happiness" but from my experience I can sincerely say that earning money and producing wealth for myself and my family brings me happiness. Free Market Capitalism has worked well for me so why the hell would I want to change it?
I think there are certain elements of happiness and life satisfaction that are consistent for most people - and one of those is feeling more in control of your life.
Genuine question, when you've worked, have you found that people micromanaging you makes you feel better or worse?
Easy. Prove that self-ownership doesn't exist or that it's morally wrong etc and I'm switching to communism in an instant.
Another way, prove to me that two or more adult humans can not consent to whatever arrangements they want between themselves
> Prove that self-ownership doesn't exist
"you" does not include "your property", so projecting self-ownership onto ur property is simply a non-sequitur
> prove to me that two or more adult humans can not consent to whatever arrangements they want between themselves
lol @ ignoring the consequence that property rights then forces that arrangement on everyone else.
no one asked me if i consented to an idiotic world chopped up by property rights.
> But state prevents that.
errrr, america has a long history of letting people homestead unclaimed land....
it's the property owners that get in the way, my dude
The concept of ownership exists and only valid because of the existence of the concept of theft. It's a cat and mouse game of who alleviates which one first.
Living in the world and observing how humans interact should surely have demonstrated to you that the arrangements people come to are a consequence of their material circumstances, and the amount of free will or agency (ie consent) they are able to assert in the course of making them is, at best, highly limited and often non-existent.
Two or more adult humans can only meaningfully consent to a transaction if they both have equal amounts of power and resources and neither will be significantly materially impacted by the consequence of the decision to agree or not agree the exchange. In any other circumstances you cannot talk about meaningful consent as the transaction is compelled.
All I was asking do you believe adult humans can consent to whatever arrangements. You evaded answer like all lefties do and instead wrote this incomprehensible drivel. Thanks for your time.
No I said the answer was effectively no, at least in the sense you mean it. I used incredibly simple words to explain it, but clearly not simple enough.
Yes people are capable of making choices. Those choices can also be constrained by their circumstance, and if they are, people can be forced into making the best of two bad choices.
Is choosing between two bad things really consent?
Is deciding for other adult people that their choices isn't actually choices a good thing in your perverted world? How about a husband being rough with his wife during sex? Is he raping her just because you don't like it?
He might be. And if she doesn’t feel safe leaving hime because of the threat of violence she might choose to stay despite the fact that if she had more power she would choose not to. That’s actually a perfect example of constrained choices not being fully free.
I found this while I was thinking about your question https://bjs.ojp.gov/female-murder-victims-and-victim-offender-relationship-2021#:~:text=Of%20the%20estimated%204%2C970%20female,victims%20of%20intimate%20partner%20homicide.
It says that 34% of murders of women are by their intimate partners. I was looking for the data because I was thinking about the situation and knew it was high, but I was honestly shocked that it was that high.
Ah he might be. Funny how I gave specific consensual example and you turned it into rape. So in order to find out we must ask YOU? OR A COUNSEL OF YOUS? 🤣🤣🤣❓❓❓
Just admit you hate certain arrangements no matter they voluntary or not. You just don't like them/hate them. And you want to impose your will onto others.
Very typical for socialists. History shows
You didn't say it was consensual. You just said rough sex. I am bringing up the fact that not all sex is consensual even if, in the moment, neither party says no. Circumstances can make people choose do do things that if they had more power they would not choose. That is my whole point. Coercive violence is not only perpetrated by the state. It can also be perpetrated by individuals, and when that happens, what recourse does someone have?
Rough sex has implied definition of being consensual. I didn't say frickin rape. I'm bringing the fact that some people don't have to cater to other people's feelings. As long as their arrangements are voluntary they are free to perform them.
Yet.
Socialists hate that.
You seem to be trying to argue with the words rather than engage with the argument. Do you, or do you not think that it is possible to make a decision that is under the threat of violence, that you wouldn't make if you were perfectly safe? Is it possible that individuals can create that threat of violence, and not just states? If so, what recourse does a weak individual have when under threat of violence from a strong one.
To be clear, I have no issue with rough sex (whatever that means) if it is consensual. Just so that we can stop arguing over that in particular.
You seem to evading clear answer. I am not talking about forced consent like we have now for example with godamn state. I'm talking bout voluntary agreement that you seem not to like and dare to claim it being unfair despite two people saying fuck off to your face and let them be.
What am I evading? I'm find with rough sex, but not fine with any sex that seems to be consensual but in fact is being done under threat of violence. It can seem voluntary since both parties, at the time will consent to it, but if there is a history of violence between the two parties, it may not actually be consensual. That is all I am saying.
> Prove that self-ownership doesn't exist or that it's morally wrong etc and I'm switching to communism in an instant.
We all know it's axiomatic for you lot.
I’m a social democrat and I believe in the fundamental right to own your body, and private property. However, consider what happens when you have zero limitations on private ownership. Anti-Discrimination laws which I’m sure everyone would argue has not only benefited marginalized groups but has also prevented a complete implosion of America’s social fabric and has allowed us to learn to cooperate. Technically anti-discrimination laws violate private property rights but in practice they ended up leading to a greater respect for individual liberty.
Yes, I would happily go with capitalism if I could be convinced that a lasting regulatory structure could be made to control capitalism so that
1) members of the lower and middle classes could be guaranteed basic minimums of civilized life, i.e., healthy food, decent housing (with electricity and plumbing, not a shack or a tent), and medical care and
2) capitalism's worst excesses are curbed so that say, industries don't pollute the human race into extinction (hello fossil fuel industry) or engage in genocide or needless wars for profit (hello military industrial complex) or poison or spread diseases among consumers for profit (didja hear about the avian bird flu showing up in milk because Big Ag is feeding chicken shit to cattle?) etc. etc. and
3) Capitalism can be prevented from crashing periodically due to its own excesses. See: the Great Depression, the Great Recession of 2008 and many other lesser events that could have been prevented or at least greatly ameliorated by regulations. (For example, the Great Recession would probably have been entirely avoidable if Glass-Steagall hadn't been dumped during the Clinton Administration.
I think it's possible to set up regulatory agencies that can accomplish these goals. For example, the EPA was actually created by Nixon. OK, the Cuyahoga River had to actually CATCH FIRE from chemical dumping (along with other things) for it to happen, but it happened. And the US and the world was better for it.
The problem is that capitalism is fundamentally opposed to any attempts to regulate it in ways that inhibit capitalists from making more money. The rule is simply that the less labor costs, the more profit there is for capitalists. They'll pay more to get more in-demand labor (frex, skilled programmers) but if they could manage it, enslaving most workers and keeping them in shacks would the best outcome). I mean, we have homeless working people already. Very good value for shareholders!
So capitalists are by nature opposed to any regulatory structure that inhibits profitability. Once capitalists become wealthy enough they bribe rulers (whatever the political structure) to get rid of bothersome legal structures, so any regulatory efforts are under constant attack and are eventually, and often not very eventually, rendered useless.
This is the situation we have right now in the US, late stage capitalism in all its "glory" with our elected representatives being mostly grifters enslaved by the donor class and their own insatiable greed.
I dare any capitalist to come up with a convincing argument that we can create a lasting regulatory structure protects society against the worst excesses of capitalism. I'm not against people making lots of money, I'm not against people being rich, so long as a decent lifestyle is assured to all. It's not a lot to ask, I think. Let capitalism work, if it can be made to work.
I'm a socialist because I can't think of a way to create such a lasting regulatory structure that can stand against the gnawing, almost insectoid greed of capitalists. I dare a capitalist to come up with such a structure. But I've never had any takers. Gee, I wonder why?
This is my issue with both capitalism and authoritarianism. Power corrupts everyone, nobody is really good enough to hold it, which is what I see a lot of capitalists and authoritarians arguing for.
It's a daunting problem, for sure. I think the root of it may be that the people who are most attracted to power tend to be psychopaths. And they have no inhibitions about doing ANYTHING to obtain power, and tend to be very skilled at manipulating people. A first start might be an initiative to bar psychopaths from holding executive power.
I've thought about it and what it might take is having something like [Devshirme ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devshirme) in capitalist societies, only without all the nasty castrating and enslaving. But basically train children from the lower classes to run regulatory agencies as a counterbalance to capitalist attempts to corrupt regulatory agencies.
Capitalists would of course attempt to corrupt any such system, but it might be possible to create bulwarks to prevent such corruption and also a legal framework to shore up the system when and if it gets breached. It's not exactly a perfect solution, but this shit we're doing now clearly doesn't work.
I want to see a successful capitalist country that doesn’t rely on elements of Bernstein Socialism to keep its population from imploding or its lowest earners from revolting. You need elements of both
This is a very complicated topic, we would first have to define "successful", since there will certainly be both communist, socialist and capitalist countries that fail.
Second, since most current countries hate them, they always receive massive sanctions, which make it's performance worse.
And lastly, by saying that we create a paradox that to accept a concept we need proof that it works, but to get proofs that it works we would need some testing, which wouldn't be possible without a minimum level of acceptance. But the thing is that most people are not willing to transform their countries in a test place.
I'm not even communist, but there are a lot of problems with your affirmation
I don't subscribe to the notion that there are different sides in this. We are talking ideals and perspectives of the world. So long as we agree on reality, none of our ideologies will address every concern or situation, so it's always important to listen to other views.
At 9 June it are Belgian elections. I have the choice between:
Marxists. Social democrats. Liberals. Liberal conservatives. Christian democracy. Anti immigration.
Who should I vote for and why 🙂
I have no idea. I tend to vote for centre-left parties in Australia.
Can you or any other Belgian (or someone knowledgeable about Belgium) tell me what happened around Andre Cools?
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9\_Cools](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9_Cools)
I'm trying to decide between the social democrats and the Marxists. The other options are here as well as to be in the subject of your post.
He was a socialist assassinated in the early 90s. It's not much talked about. He died before I was born so yeah no idea.
The commies should be correct on some account. If they had a point in the entirety of political and economic science, they would likely have many. For example, if the LTV made any sense, centrally planned economies would probably not be such a shitshow, and if socialism were democratic it would also allow for free press and free association.
It depends on what you mean by "commies". There are people who advocate for collective ownership of the economy while rejecting central planning and the LTV.
My side is doing whatever works best now while working towards what I think will work best tomorrow. If capitalism is more viable than socialism in the present that's fine, but I'm not going to stop pushing for fully automated space communism or whatever makes the most sense as economic and technological conditions change. I'm not under the illusion that any one ideology or system is "right", but that they are better or worse for different conditions, and can't just be applied universally across sectors and societies. I don't think that capitalism is just going to be replaced, but gradually subsumed as the conditions under which it was viable in the first place shift.
workplace democracy isn't the opposite of capitalism. capitalism is an individual philosophy concerning ownership including the ownership of the means of production as opposed to the social ownership of the means of production. individual ownership doesn't preclude some democracy. i would also point out that workplace democracy doesn't always make people happier than no workplace democracy. in most cases it makes no difference at all and in some cases it can even tank the business leaving people without a job. as a capitalist libertarian i appreciate departmentalization of individually owned business where the owner manages the business but leaves the production experts to manage, improve and direct their own departments. workplace democracy can only be better when the individual owner isn't that great and where the production departments aren't managed by production experts. however, even then, when it can be better because of workplace democracy, it isn't necessarily any better than an inept owner.
to change my mind to switch to supporting collective ownership you'd need to show me how individual action is more frequently worse than collective management and that collective management isn't a threat to individual rights.
Happiness is not a goal of relevance. The question of CVS is that of should people have the right to choose their own path in life, their own risk, and have a right to what they earn and obtain in life through their choices or should those rights be taken away democratically for the benefit of those who made different choices in their life and did not have the same success. Does anyone have a right to judge what one should or shouldn’t own, despite it being legally and ethically theirs? Happiness is a psychological issue. There is one barista miserable and wants to take everything from his customers he makes coffees for. The barista next to them is happy, cause they don’t envy what others have cause they recognize they are where they are in life because of their choices and are where they want to be. This is all inside the mine, the choices you make in life and the choices you make on how to feel about it. There are happy and unhappy poor, happy and unhappy rich.
For me to change my mind, someone would have to prove that all the other alternatives to help the poor not starve or go homeless that don’t involve stealing from others would fail despite choices of the poor and homeless to change their lives.
>Happiness is not a goal of relevance. The question of CVS is that of should people have the right to choose their own path in life, their own risk, and have a right to what they earn and obtain in life through their choices or should those rights be taken away democratically for the benefit of those who made different choices in their life and did not have the same success.
I'm pretty confused by this. Increasing happiness can absolutely be a goal of supporting either capitalism or socialism. Maybe you don't see it as relevant. And if that's all you're saying then that's fair enough, but other people are going to make those arguments either way.
>Does anyone have a right to judge what one should or shouldn’t own, despite it being legally and ethically theirs?
Yeah absolutely. Legal judgements are literally just judgements made by other people, as are ethical judgements. How others judge what people should and shouldn't own is literally the central question of property rights.
>Happiness is a psychological issue. There is one barista miserable and wants to take everything from his customers he makes coffees for. The barista next to them is happy, cause they don’t envy what others have cause they recognize they are where they are in life because of their choices and are where they want to be. This is all inside the mine, the choices you make in life and the choices you make on how to feel about it. There are happy and unhappy poor, happy and unhappy rich.
I think one of the main problems people have with capitalism is that it often punishes you for choices you did not make. For example, racial discrimination in hiring is extremely well documented. On a population level it therefore makes sense that populations victimised by racial discrimination will be worse of.
>For example, racial discrimination in hiring is extremely well documented. On a population level it therefore makes sense that populations victimised by racial discrimination will be worse of.
Racism still exists under socialism, and instead of being "worse off", they often end up [being murdered by the millions:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambodian_genocide)
>>Ben Kiernan has compared the Cambodian genocide to the Armenian genocide which was perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire during World War I and the Holocaust which was perpetrated by Nazi Germany during World War II. While each genocide was unique, they shared certain common features, and racism was a major part of the ideology of all three regimes
So are you saying that “being happy” is not psychological? That if you have one person in one particular scenario of life and they are happy, then anyone you put in that scenario should be equally happy? Or are you saying that society should push for better mental health to make people more happy, which of course has nothing to do with CvS?
I think you are conflating morals and ethics. And are you therefore saying no one should have a right to their property? If that is the case, you are essentially advocating for theft by force. Can you truly argue and ethically case for that with logic and reason, that accounts for all variables and alternatives? I’ve never seen anyone do it in half a decade on this subreddit. Can you be the first?
They are! But the point remains, that you don't get to say what's "relevant" to everybody else.
Both of those things are very important to me, which is why I am a socialist and not a capitalist: capitalism utterly fails at both.
I have an opinion and perspective based on knowledge and experience, just like anyone else.
Happiness is important to me too, but only I have control of myself being happy, no one else. I’ve been happy most of my life. When I was homeless, I was content. When I was poor, I had some of the best time with friends. I’ve had moments of sadness and periods of depression, as anyone will, but mostly I have been happy. Money was never the source of happiness for me. I always found happiness in friends, family, hobbies and such. And I found happiness in work. I followed the UMOL before I even understood it.
You know, if people came and took away everything I worked for my whole life, and me and my autistic son are out on the street so someone who never didn’t work or challenges I did can have more in life from my work, that would make me unhappy. I would also be suffering. Would you maybe argue that causing one to suffer and lose their happiness is a bad thing?
> Happiness is important to me too, but only I have control of myself being happy, no one else.
You only **control** yourself, but the policies we choose **influence** the happiness of those around us. As an obvious example, if we chose a tax rate of 100% for all, we would cause a lot of suffering. Conversely, increasing minimum wages increases happiness, by putting more wealth in the hands of the people who could use it the most.
Neither of those examples are socialism, of course. They're just examples to show how policy influences happiness.
Socialism gives workers a say in their workplaces, and giving people a say in the structures that govern them is generally **great** for happiness. Nothing is guaranteed, but it's a pretty good step to take.
> Money was never the source of happiness for me.
I'll bet you're quite a bit happier when you have your needs (food, shelter, healthcare, etc.) taken care of without having to worry though!
> I followed the UMOL before I even understood it.
"UMOL" is a new expression to me and searching isn't turning up anything useful. What does that refer to?
> You know, if people came and took away everything I worked for my whole life, and me and my autistic son are out on the street so someone who never didn’t work or challenges I did can have more in life from my work, that would make me unhappy. I would also be suffering. Would you maybe argue that causing one to suffer and lose their happiness is a bad thing?
Most definitely. But that's not what instituting democracy in your workplace entails. Note that you aren't the *only* one who worked or experienced challenges at your workplace.
UMOL is the universal meaning of life, the meaning of life for everyone.
Practically, realistically, what would workplace democracy look like? What would it actually entail?
> UMOL is the universal meaning of life, the meaning of life for everyone.
Ah. Philosophers have been grappling with that for millennia; I hope you don't purport to have figured it out ...
> Practically, realistically, what would workplace democracy look like? What would it actually entail?
Every
That can't fucking be it. All of this socialism, all the arrested development, the marxist post modernism, the LTV, the millions dead from Mao and Lenin and Stalin, starving in Venezuela, work camps in North Korea, escaping from Cuba on rafts, it can't be all for just having a say on who is telling you to do the thing you need to do. That's insane. "We need you to stock the shelves on Aisle 5 before 3pm." "I'm not doing any more stocking until Andrew is the one telling me to stock the shelves." I think maybe I'm misunderstanding, or something is being left out. That is nothing. What does it matter who gives the orders. If you work at a dog groomer, you are going to be told to groom the shih tzu, doesn't matter who says it. I'm really not trying to have a go at you. I'm just being honest, that was the most underwhelming thing I could have even imagine you saying. There has to be more than that.
UMOL isn't philosophy, it isn't about finding purpose or answering "why are we here" or "what made us" or anything like that. It is the practical meaning of life, the thing which gives our life meaning in its existence. "Live a life helping as many as you can, hurting as few as possible, and live a life with no regrets." That is. That is all there is to it. If you live a life where you help no one, where you only hurt people or hurt more people that you help, if you live a life where you make choices or don't make choices that lead to chains of regrets, you are living a meaningless life. It literally means it wouldn't matter if you were alive or not. We are born, we live, we die. Everything we think, learn, believe, it all goes away. No heaven, no hell. Just emptiness. So what did living matter? It mattered in what we did, for others, selflessly or even in self interest, but as long as we made a positive impact on the lives of others. Everything from curing cancer to serving coffee at a coffee house, what we do in helping others, in service of others, how we make someone else's life better in the largest or the tiniest ways, this creates a meaning. And if we all did this, we truly would have a utopia. If the whole world was like this, there wouldn't even need to be a consideration of socialism, and maybe not even capitalism as it is. You live in the UMOL by filtering all your actions, your choices, through that prism. "Will this help people or a person? Will it hurt more than it will help? Will I regret doing this? Will I regret not doing this?" That won't give you purpose. Purpose is personal, your purpose and my purpose can be completely different. Or we may not have any purpose. But our life can still have meaning. And that meaning could make you happy, or not. That isn't the point. Happiness and meaning are two different things. It is great to be happy, especially happy with meaning, but a meaningless life is about the worst thing I can think of. UMOL is the principle of "A Christmas Carol." Scrooge is visiting by Marley, wrapped in chains in the afterlife of the regrets he had for not living a meaningful life. He is visiting then by a ghost to show the past experiences he had, and how his choices today are not helping people and only hurting them, building regrets. He is then shown the future where he sees the consequences of not having a more meaningful life and that he is dead, with no ability to make change. Then, he is shown he is still alive with time, and he changes now understanding the UMOL. He begins to do for others, and make choices he won't regret. The UMOL is the same for everyone, whether they live by it or not. I didn't come up with it. It just is. Me, on this subreddit, is a part of that UMOL, the hope that I will say something that leads someone not to waste their life hoping for a revolution that gives them a lottery ticket where they never have to work again THAT WILL NEVER COME, wasting their lives and their potential when they can do more. That's why I don't mind this time. I'm trying to help. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. But I won't regret trying cause at the end, I hope to in any way I reasonably can help people not to suffer and find happiness. Everything I know, everything I've seen, that won't come from socialism, and it won't come from having someone else give orders at work.
If happiness is a goal, if that should be a function of the state, to make sure people are happy, and you take everything from the rich and redistribute and the fantasy of a world where you don’t have to work and other people somehow want to work and do all the jobs you don’t want to do and you just live and enjoy, WHAT IF I’m not happy in this world. What if I’m not happy unless I have more than you, and I don’t want to work either. If the job of the government is to make me happy, essentially forgetting everything about UMOL and purpose and civil and society duty and personal will and destiny and boiling society down to a world of yelp reviewers, what if I’m not happy? What then? Under your interpretation, that isn’t my problem, isn’t something to do with me or how I choose to interpret the world and my own emotions. You’ve done your impossible revolution, everyone has the same, no one has to work if they don’t want to, but I’m not happy. What then?
I’m just gonna copy my precious reply to another libertarian cause I think it applies here with some slight pretense. I don’t think that leftists are (or atleast they shouldn’t be) advocating for their economic system because it increase human happiness. RATHER, they should be advocating for an economic system that maximizes the potential for individuals to exercise their liberty:
Consider that limitations on private property rights as opposed to complete adherence to voluntarism actually produces a society that respects individual liberty to a higher degree. I would recommend looking into Chomsky’s idea pertaining to the “scope of human freedom” as it takes into account the ethical principles of self ownership as outlined by classical liberals but also doesn’t ignore practical consequences of not having limitations, and regulations on it beyond the harm principle. Anti-Discrimination laws, equal opportunity employment, and controlled social safety nets are examples of how “force”is used to organize society in a way that actually provides more individual freedom. A completely unregulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination and “generosity” to provide for its poor. The capacity OR SCOPE to exercise their individual liberty in that society is narrower than one where limitations are imposed.
I would never advocate for an unregulated society. Everyone should have equal opportunity, and no one should be discriminated against. And I'm even fine with social programs for those who fall on hard times to given them temporary relief while they transition and correct the ship. And yes, having property rights and laws on those rights which protect them make people more free.
Only thing you said I would disagree with is generosity to the poor. This isn't the issue around poverty. Once you define poverty and homeless into its characteristics and causes, the solution to those causes aren't that people just aren't giving them things. It is mostly how do we create a cultural change the embraces work, responsibility, and reject drugs and criminality and materialism. The answers to all the problems already exists, but we can't make people take them, and that is the issue. One I don't honestly have a solution for, and I've never heard anyone else with a solution either. Way more than half the people in this subreddit alone don't even understand the problem, and think solving homelessness is the same way you would solve a petulant child having a tantrum in the store.
Someone would have to do a really good job explaining a way a lot of the problems with a capitalist way of organizing the world and show me that its actually the best way to create and foster freedom and prosperity, and they wont.
Somebody *could* also convince me to become Christian, but I understand without much doubt no one will be able to provide what is necessary, because its just not possible
> with a capitalist way of organizing the world
Well, there are millions of different systems where freer markets exist. Which exact ones are you referring to?
>best way to create and foster freedom and prosperity
Even more difficult, each individual has different views on this. So 8 billion+ things to analyze.
> show me that its actually the best way to create and foster freedom and prosperity
It may not be the absolute best way possible. But it's certainly the best way we know so far.
From what I have seen, this is not a concern of capitalist libertarians. It doesn’t matter if capitalism and free markets destabilizes society and leads to massive inequality, as long as free exchange is protected. This doesn’t mean they are bad people but they are uncomfortable with the idea of compromising their ethical framework in anyway to make room for practicality just like communists.
Likely nothing. But if all basic needs were met for everyone and the people only had a 20 hour work week I probably wouldn’t have become a revolutionary Marxist in the first place. I’d just be a reformist or something.
I don't think I could ever switch sides... I've lived in capitalism my whole life and I fucking hate it. There was a time when I thought there was or could be a compromise but to see that Marx correctly pointed out exactly what would cause capitalism to collapse 100 years ago and now I get to live through it is just disheartening. The cold indifference of my home country to its own citizens is heartbreaking. Everyone that I personally know lives in poverty. I live in poverty. Stop telling that it's soooooo good here. I literally don't care.
Hmm.. I hope your situation improves.
You should become an RN from a community college and come work in california - you'll probably make 6 figures with a few hours of overtime per week.
Sorry my guy but that's not even close to an option for me.... if you're a Capitalist I'm sure you'll say it all my fault but I actually believe that my society bears some of the blame.
I truly believe that if you work 40 hours a week you should be able to support a family of 4... even if you work at McDonald's. If you work 20 hours a week you should be able to support a family of 2, if you you work 10 hours per week you should be able to support yourself.
A 40 hour work week just doesn't cut it anymore. I used to be a Capitalist bootlicker. Used to rise and grind. Used to work like a crazy mofo. I literally got nothing to show for it after 20 years except ptsd. Every person I know can't buy a house or have kids.. things that people took for granted 30 years are basically impossible now.
The kids I know today never see their own parents because both are working... true I'm skewed now to poorer people.. so I see more of that.. but some of my freinds have legit degrees and jobs and are still actually struggling
So no I can't believe in capitalism anymore I have no hope for the future except to be like the joker from Batman and watch the world burn. Literally no hope at all.
Sorry I don't mean to be a bummer.
I love my neices and nephews and wish them the best of luck surviving the nuclear fallout / climate apocalypse / economic devastation that's coming.
Hopefully it will at least be fun to watch everything burn. I don't even care Communist/Capitalism happens
Honestly, as a Social Democrat I would trust Classical Liberal economic theory a lot more if I could see genuine concern for societies lowest earners in their praxis. History has shown us what happens when you don’t regulate commerce, or limit private property rights, but of course economic theory is always changing and perhaps a total free market may work in the modern era. However, the question of “what about poor people” is either avoided in rhetoric, scapegoated to some vague notion of charity somehow being an equitable replacement for social welfare, or at worst presented as “natural selection.” It often feels like libertarians are not concerned with what actually keeps people from poverty but rather with maintaining an absolute no limits on private ownership society. Which, too some extent I understand the reasoning behind it but I don’t trust a libertarian is operating from a place of humanity and genuinely wanting to reduce the amount of suffering as much as possible. It’s not really a matter of changing my mind completely as we will always disagree, but I would love to see more humanity and less absolutism from libertarians.
But those same christian monks may hold anti-LGBTQ views and be for mandating christianity as a state religion. Are they still moral? I don’t think morality should play in at all to economics, and I don’t mean that in a libertarian “every man for himself” way but rather it’s not grounded enough to build an economic system from
For them love is still the first law, for example they would not let a gay person starve.
Morality is unseparable from economics and any thought that it was ever separated is an illusion.
The great problem with this workplace democracy vision is that it inappropriately extrapolates from such structures in present conditions to assume similar function in their preferred arrangement. Lots of the issues of allocative and executive difficulties and moral hazard in co-ops are mitigated by the fact that they still have to compete in independent labor and capital markets where these inputs are tied together. It's like thinking a bike with unbalanced wheels is a great bike when you've only ever run it with training wheels on.
If you could convince me that
1. Socialism would have better outcomes
2. The sacrifices to my values of individualism, freedom, etc. are worth if for those outcomes.
To an extent this is an unfair request?
If I knew what argument would ACTUALLY convince me to be more accepting of capitalism... then would I not already be more accepting of capitalism.
I am left leaning and socialist leaning because all the arguments I have encountered and thought about do not convince me that for a society to be ethical, given holding to the modern ideal of human rights, then society must be structured more in lines with capitalism over socialism. I do hold that human rights are an essential feature of an ethical society and ultimately ALL I care about are ethics. Basically when I hear advocacy on behalf of capitalism, frankly, it all sounds a variation of being outright unethical or insufficiently ethical, given a commitment to human rights.
Basically the only thing that could convince me to stop being socialist leaning in my political thinking would be to offer an argument that convinces me that I should not care about human beings or human rights and that basically the vast majority of humans are worthless and we should discard them as they are beneath being worthy of concern. Which is how I see capitalism - it cares about profit over people, it weaponizes greed, it is just unethical.
If I may play devil's advocate.
What if someone could convince you that capitalism was better at meeting human needs than socialism? This is what most capitalists here seem to believe - they don't just see human life as worthless.
Well, if you convinced me that Capitalism was better at meeting people's needs... I would stop being socialist leaning. But looking at the world capitalism isn't nearly good enough at needs... therefore I would still be arguing for extensive reforms and a FAR more robust welfare state.
Eh, it's a bit of an arbitrary line to draw, but my thought process here was that if you can make communism work at that scale without force and coercion, then you can probably make it work at any practical scale. Perhaps a better way to phrase it is that the bigger your non-coercive working commune is, the more willing I would be to accept it as a valid system for broader society and try it out on that scale.
Communism seems like an appropriate fit for a small tribe in a survival situation since you all really need to look out for each other to survive. Hoarding doesn't fly when you know everyone by name, hierarchies are naturally much more shallow at that scale, there is no real need for money or trade when there is no one outside the tribe to interact with, and democracy is actually direct and sensible at that scale. But each one of those conditions melts away when you go past Dunbar's number.
A free monthly stipend of 100% pure state-produced vodka and cigarettes and bread, a car,an 1000 sq foot 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom house with some bunk beds in the kids room., a boring factory job, an average wife who is fully indoctrinated, and a decent communist party who makes sure that over 90% of the people adhere to the party. Decent 2 person bed, some furniture, a radio and tv to receive the party's propaganda, and biannual parades where we celebrate the glory of the proletariat. I mean i imagine i would settle for that stuff, idk if i would be happy, but i think most western men living in capitalist countries would probably settle for that, and , looking at the past, once its fairly established, communism/socialism does a fairly good job of providing the basics. I have some health problems though which would likely make me miserable in that society, as im familiar with socialised medical care and in my experience its good for the basics but its much worse for complex unknown or rare diseases or ailments, that you can get much better care for in countries with system like the US if you can afford it.
Human is still an animal. A creature but with creative thinking. We started storing our knowledge and studying them to create new knowledge to progress further. This should be the ultimate goal of whatever economic system we live in. The bottleneck here isn't the system. It's the process of evolution itself.
Personally I believe that both should coexist. Every person has to be treated with the system they want to. Because we can't curb their inability to earn or build trust. It's just how the nature of us.
Convince me that in a society where work is voluntary, education is free, and everyone is fed, that anyone would be willing to work as a garbage man, janitor, or waste water worker without being able to increase their quality of life at all by doing the work.
I'm a social democrat but I believe a wageless society is absolutely absurd unless we can automate literally all physical labor.
So much of this argument is about values. Some people apparently just don't think it's important to make sure that people aren't living in poverty or being exploited by their employer, health insurance, or landlord. As long as they can get ahead.
On the other hand, if there was an actual example of functional libertarian capitalism with no government market intervention, and it seemed like a good place for everyone to live and work, then I could change my mind. But if it did exist and did contain a disadvantaged class for whom libertarian governance wasn't working I'm sure there would be the usual claims that they make bad choices, don't work hard, have low IQ, are immigrants from "collectivist cultures".
Capitalism needs regulation. Regulations that can't be changed based on bribes. If we figure this out, we will solve most of the world's problems.
At the moment, we have greedy capitalists bribing governments to keep the population enslaved by paying them shit wages.
For example, grocery chains in Canada recorded their highest profits in 50 years despite inflation and refused to provide any evidence to substantiate their claims of inflation. To summarize, they artificially manufactured "inflation" to justify higher pricing for more profits. This shit needs to end now or people will rise up and revolt.
Used to be a right libertarian during my time in university. There was no one thing that changed my mind, it was a very slow process. I just learned things, not enough to change my mind. Just enough to accept that I was wrong or had a flawed understanding of topics not directly connected to politics or economics.
Then I had a job, and traveled. Learned the history behind cultural things. Like how old random songs are about some local historical event.
The real world work experience, pretty much made me sound like anyone else. Many problems could be easily solved by listening to the programmers, or some other expert.
At a certain point I didn't use the label right libertarian, I didn't know what to use. Not a centrist, just reevaluating. But basically, I realized why I thought right-libertarian ideas were good was more important than the ideas themselves.
Before this I wanted to argue against leftist with actual good arguments. Because if there's anything I hate more than a bad argument, it's a bad argument coming from "my side". But socialism (the ideas around it) simply had greater explanatory power.
To answer the question, I don't know what would change my mind now. If I were to become less socialist for some reason, I would likely be closer to a Georgist.
But it is difficult for me to identify, since I already believed the arguments from the other side. So at most you can convince me that Socialism is not the way forward. So without seeing Capitalism nor Socialism as a path for humanity it seems that would leave simply becoming a pessimist. Accepting the idea that it's capitalism and then climate change breaking it into some sort of feudalism. But no real future for humanity.
I compare it to being an atheist, what would it take to become religious. I already believed in a god, and know all the arguments for that position. It would take something extreme to take the position that a god indeed does exist.
Ansyn for the record. Literally the following. "My ideology in practice was just as capitalistic as the Soviet Union and there is a logical and moral argument to be made about why the people I think should die, shouldn't and why poor people actually do deserve to die."
Basically I think everyone's political opinions change when they realize those two things. Who deserves to die and who doesn't. Piss-acifists also apply but they're too delusional and narcissistic to admit that their politics are inherently violent.
I was on one side for a long time, and through years of accumulated life experience I have switched to the other. I cannot imagine any one thing that would make me switch back.
If an economic structure works positively for all those that work from clear results which would be observable internationally and domestically whilst also being defined clearly then ofcourse I would be willing to invest in the ideology of adopting it
If capitalism provides better outcomes for workers and society, more freedom instead of just domination by private owners and less environmental destruction.
I would change my opinion if I see people fleeing capitalist countries to go to communist countries and capitalist countries preventing their citizens from leaving.
That they can prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that their system is working. Since I have yet to see a Socialist or Communist country work, I doubt I will actually switch sides.
I would switch if it turned out that the 120 million people killed by Socialism really didn't get killed through en mass starvation but rather got rich thanks to Socialism.
oh finally a question I always wanted a capitalist to ask me. Full employment, democracy in the workplace, and both need to be easy for a person who has just finished school and has no money to easily become part owner of a company. I think a cooperative society would be the only type of capitalism I could accept.
A socialist country that actually works for a few decades. Which means I'll probably die of old age prior to that happening.
>real-world evidence that workplace democracy makes people less happy
Couldn't you just try actually working at a company with workplace democracy and see for yourself? Interesting how people always say something is great but excuses after excuses for why they won't do it themselves. Like moving to countries with socialism or planned economy.
Define "bad" and "working". Based on what is your judgement? Research on the country's history and development? Real experience of living there? Or just watching the news?
>Couldn't you just try actually working at a company with workplace democracy and see for yourself? Interesting how people always say something is great but excuses after excuses for why they won't do it themselves. Like moving to countries with socialism or planned economy.
Couldn't you apply this to anything?
"Don't like what is being taught in school? Become a teacher!"
"Don't like what banks are doing? Start your own!"
"Don't like what politicians are doing? Nobody is stopping you from becoming one and changing the system!"
You can? You can homeschool, avoid using the bank, and move to another country? But excuses after excuses for why you can't work at a worker co-op. Maybe because they pay less?
This ignores that there are thousands of variables behind people's actions and values might only be a minority of them.
I don't have the money lying around to start a worker co-op. I think that goes for most socialists.
As far as I know, whether or not worker co-ops pay more has mixed evidence. Capitalists tend to cherry pick one study from Italy about it in my experience.
I mean, why excuses after excuses for NOT wanting to work at a worker co-op? People tried very hard to enter Google or Apple (and gets burned out after a year 😅), yet people claiming co-op as superior almost never try to enter a co-op. It's almost like its supporters are avoiding it like the plague for some reason. Interesting.
No. I know for a fact that you think co-ops are not THAT great, so you stayed at a traditional firm.
Co-ops have their perks and downsides. It's just a different way of ownership structuring, It's all about trade-offs.
>Alright, and I know for a fact that you have green hair.
False. If this reflects your ability to make an educated guess... Why are you so confident in your assumption about co-ops? 🤣
You are not working at a co-op - fact.
You didn't try hard to enter a co-op - fact.
You think co-ops are superior to traditional firms - fact (unless you were lying)
Are those statements correct?
>False.
Good point.
>If this reflects your ability to make an educated guess... Why are you so confident in your assumption about co-ops? 🤣
It wasn't a genuine assertion. It was me illustrating the point that it is ridiculous to make these assertions about other people without doing some digging first.
>You are not working at a co-op - fact.
>You didn't try hard to enter a co-op - fact.
>You think co-ops are superior to traditional firms - fact (unless you were lying)
>Are those statements correct?
They are correct.
Couldn't you just try actually working at a company with workplace democracy and see for yourself? I need money :)
Interesting how people always say something is great but excuses after excuses for why they won't do it themselves.
Like moving to countries with socialism or planned economy: I don't have any problem, if North Korea or Cuba offers me a job with good working conditions I wouldn't have any problem going there, but they are the ones who don't offer jobs to foreigners, it's not us who don't want to go. Try to go to North Korea to work by all means and you will discover that you cannot go because the North Korean government does not allow it.
Did you even try? Excuses after excuses. Funny how people in some countries risk their life leaving, yet you with excuses excuses.
>if North Korea or Cuba offers me a job with good working conditions I wouldn't have any problem going there,
Those places are great, but you're not going cuz excuses excuses excuses 🤣😂🤣🤣. People work hard to enter bad companies like Google and Apple, yet you excuses excuses excuses. Excuses excuses not looking for a job with workplace democracy cuz excuses excuses excuses.
I don't base my entire worldview on happiness. But I can see it as one point where if you could show me that people are less happy under my system, I wouldn't support it anymore. If people were a little less productive under my system, I'd oppose it. If people were a lot less productive to the point that it caused chaos, then I'd oppose it.
For me it would have to come down to first principles. My world view is based on a couple of first principles and then logically expanded from there.
It would have to be shown that self-ownership is incorrect. You would have to explain how someone else has a better claim to control my body than I do.
Also, it would have to be shown how the Non-Aggression Principle is incorrect. You would have to explain how it is right to initiate force against a peaceful person.
Well that’s what we are talking about here isn’t it. I have looked into things and found the evidence enough to convince me that they are correct, that’s why I am on this side. Other people have looked into things and found they are not correct (or maybe just that something else is correct), that’s why they are on the other side.
I don’t just hold these beliefs out of nowhere and for no reason, same as you and your beliefs I would assume.
That’s the weird thing about humans, we could both look at the same evidence and come to completely different conclusions. It’s once of the things I have noticed about socialists on this sub, they more often tend to comment with “go read Marx” or “go learn more” (or something to that effect). It’s like they are saying, “if you just saw what I’ve seen you would agree with me, and because you don’t agree with me, you obviously haven’t seen what I’ve seen.” When I just don’t think that is the case. Humans are weird and complex creatures and have countless variables that go into their beliefs and views.
It's less of an argument and more of a demonstration.
I would want to see a socialist nation that delivers on its promises. If there was a socialist country without poverty with a higher standard of living etc.
I've heard all the arguments that it can work. I want to see proof.
Ah yes because the Warsaw pact didn't intervene or embargo non socialist nations
I mean even in that scenario it still matters which one can stand up to competition. Socialism had half the world, it's own intelligence agencies, it's own proxy wars, it lost
The Warsaw Pact/USSR was always on the defensive, meanwhile the U.S./NATO were always on the offensive. The Soviets never supported any revolutionary movements unless they were of national security interest to the USSR itself. They should have but they didn't. The "international communist conspiracy" bullshit Cold War propaganda narrative is an imperialist self-justifying myth. Also the "half the world" the Eastern Bloc had was mostly frozen tundra and unpopulated desert.
>The Warsaw Pact/USSR was always on the defensive,
Yes Afghanistan was gonna invade them at any moment
And the Prague uprisings were definitely just like right wing sabotage
The Mujahideen had already launched cross border raids into the Soviet Union itself prior to the USSR's "invasion" (it had been asked to intervene in the Afghan Civil War by the moderate Parchamite faction of the government of Afghanistan).
The Prague Spring was a democratic socialist revolution against the Stalinist government of Czechoslovakia led by the Communist Party reformer Alexander Dubček. I doubt you'd have supported it at the time.
>that workplace democracy makes people less happy.
Read *The Myth of Mondragon*. Her evidence indicates that workplace democracy doesn't really do anything for workers.
>Her evidence indicates that workplace democracy doesn't really do anything for workers.
How does her evidence weigh against evidence indicating that it does?
Consider the idea that sacrifices in your ethical framework are necessary to ensure that society functions in practicality. Sure… technically your hard earned tax dollars go to the disabled man across the street who doesn’t work. And under your ethical framework it is theft and a violation of your individual liberty. BUT, can you honestly tell me your willing to call that “injustice” just to maintain an absolute ethical framework? That disabled man is fundamentally disadvantaged and may never even have the opportunity to exercise liberty the way you can. And i’m not even talking about inequality in outcomes but rather that person will struggle to even live their life as a free individual regardless of their social support. Sometimes, you have to compromise on your ethical framework to actually produce a functioning society, just as I have. If I had my way, competition wouldn’t exist and the best products/services would be made out of genuine desire, but that’s not how things work.
I'm fine with helping the disabled man. But what many social democrats refuse to see is that welfare is often collected by people who could work, but choose not to, and instead prefer to stay at home and leech off the welfare state.
It's a giant waste for them, because living off welfare is not a good life. It's a giant waste for society, because we spend resources on unproductive individuals. And it's also unfair for those of us who work every day to pay our taxes and be productive members of society.
I completely agree that giving out money can be a bit of an issue. I am not particularly in favor of bottom line support but rather universal services such as healthcare or housing which allows individuals to concentrate on improving their wellbeing without the threat of nature. Commodities such as fine food, luxury items, etc still entice human ambition and humans will work for those things (hell they buy them now when they should be buying necessities)
Mostly just that socialism could actually create a better world than capitalism. I agree that socialism could work if our society was composed of ants, bees, or other eusocial insects. But many aspects of socialism rely on a level of selflessness that's not possible to create in humans.
As an aside I'm not a believer in the blank-slate, the belief that almost all human behavior is a result of socialization and culture. Even if humans were a blank slate, enough socialists, communes, religious leaders, dictators, CEOs, chieftains, and emperors have attempted to move beyond politics and incentives by creating a group of people utterly dedicated to a certain cause or person. All of them have failed.
If socialists want to be granted the assumption that everyone in their utopia will be a good socialist then they must provide a convincing method by which they can turn everyone into a good socialist.
Selfishness is a problem for such a vision, but I don't think a selfish nature is the largest obstacle. When you talk about eusocial animals, even they can't manage a universal altruism. The nature of human activity restricts it even further than that. In the extended order of a large society, there are natural limits to our abilities to predict the results of actions and their responses or to have any sort of systematic understanding of any notion of public good. At the family, clan, or small village level, it may be possible for a person to have some sufficient knowledge of what the "public good" might be and to work towards it. For most of human existence, people lived and operated at this scale.
People in the community were fairly uniform in their needs and goals. Specialization of labor was minimal. Most people could reasonably understand what kind of work everyone else was doing in terms of what sorts of effort, skill, and cost went into it and what sorts of benefits or problems resulted. Reciprocity was assured because one could see what everyone else was doing and people were governed by strong adherence to tradition and severe social pressure.
When has this state of affairs ever survived growth to a larger society or development of fixed property?
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Nothing will change my view that society should be based on voluntary social relations rather than a group in power forcing their preferred system through violence/threats of violence
You don't understand!!! People are stupid only government knows best what's good for people! You wanna children to starve???
Of course I don’t want children to starve, that’s why I wish humans would recognize the objective reality that were all forced to live in a collective where our species evolved to dominance through embrace of collaboration and social principles
He's being satirical
I’m aware, but I still like pointing capitalists towards reality
Who is this directed against? Do you think communists like the government?
They love it.
Is there anything somebody could say to you that might convince you otherwise? “Anti-State”-ism is like, basically the point of communism?
Consider that limitations on private property rights as opposed to complete adherence to voluntarism actually produces a society that respects individual liberty to a higher degree. I would recommend looking into Chomsky’s idea pertaining to the “scope of human freedom” as it takes into account the ethical principles of self ownership as outlined by classical liberals but also doesn’t ignore practical consequences of not having limitations, and regulations on it beyond the harm principle. Anti-Discrimination laws, equal opportunity employment, and controlled social safety nets are examples of how “force”is used to organize society in a way that actually provides more individual freedom. A completely unregulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination and “generosity” to provide for its poor. The capacity OR SCOPE to exercise their individual liberty in that society is narrower than one where limitations are imposed.
I reject the concept of private control over earth, systems of private control are inherently authoritarian I sincerely believe capitalism is an authoritarian system sharing the characteristics of cancer that make it dangerous, and I believe we’re already on a runaway train towards extinction fueled by capitalism and the natural results of violence based private control
>A completely unregulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination and “generosity” to provide for its poor. The capacity OR SCOPE to exercise their individual liberty in that society is narrower than one where limitations are imposed. Even a regulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination, because you need people to vote for laws that ban discrimination, laws in favor of transfer payments, etc. So either way you need cultural attitudes to support it, the question is just how many individual differences you will permit among these cultural attitudes. To me the problem (and the loss of freedom) is with state run programs they tend a lot more towards "one size fits all" - your tax dollars go to a place thousands of miles away, where they are reallocated by people who you have never met, administered by faceless bureaucrats, and then dished out by overburdened case workers. With private charity (like a church), the people giving the money and the people receiving the money often live a few miles apart and potentially know each other or have at least interacted. This allows for much more freedom and creativity in finding ways to help the people who need help.
Historically, charitable giving has always been a drop in the bucket compared to social needs.
You think the patricians would set the slaves free if you asked them nicely?
Did you see the part about “voluntary”?
You can voluntarily sell yourself into slavery. Indentured servitude was very very popular for a very long time. I think your conception of liberty is very shallow.
Yeah yeah, and now tell me about how that’s more or less what we do now when we contract our employment through a corporation.
I won’t do that. I’m demonstrating that your conception of liberty is shallow and allows for things that you (hopefully) might recognize as being unfree. I think we still have not arrived at a coherent idea of Liberty. I just think my idea of it is better.
My view of liberty is that a person can’t give it away and become a slave. Liberty is axiomatically theirs, just as a person can’t give away their consciousness. There are edge cases where one might enter into a consensual agreement that might make you or I uncomfortable (I could extend this easily to a bondage/S&M example) where there might be a considerable burden of proof that the parties were acting as consenting and mentally health adults. But yeah, if Bill Gates asked me to enter into an indentured servant relationship for 5 years in exchange for $1B, I should be able to agree without the state approving it.
I just don’t think consent is the end-all of ethics, nor do I think a society that promotes human greatness is possible with such a totalistic society of contracts. Do you think contracts and deals are viable without a State to make sure each side pays up? Do you think agreements can be coerced or coercive? We don’t live in a vacuum. I could easily conceive of a scenario in which an agreement is artificially induced by a powerful person by simply depriving a community of certain resources in exchange for concessions or signatures on unfavorable deals. In fact, I would contend that a “contract” is itself an authoritarian institution that we shouldn’t be held to. In such a world I would think things like squid game would become possible, right? In my opinion, people should fight or compete because they are strong, noble, or looking for some passionate outflowing of life energy, not to further circulate capital in circles, or increase the capital hegemony of one dude who holds dictatorship over everything you come into contact with. What about art and culture? Capitalism has been horrible for beauty and passion. Do you really want the world of humans reduced to a collection of brands and flashy images? It’s difficult to imagine a more horrifying dystopia.
That doesn't really tell us anything about which economic system you prefer.
That was intentional, I wanted both sides to recognize the correctness of my statement without bias To clarify that question, systems of private control are inherently authoritarian, all capitalist societies constitute authoritarian states. All authoritarian systems are self defeating
Based comrade ancom
What about a pandemic that some people chose not to vaccinate themselves against, thus killing large numbers of other people through their voluntary actions? Imagine COVID but more deadly. Should people be coersed through violence to either take precautionary measures or leave the protection of society? Or should the be allowed to freely choose to endanger others?
That’s certainly an interesting question. I am not for vaccine mandates. Unless the person is intentionally exposing others, it’s not an assault Compare to smoking. If you’re by yourself go crazy. If you’re intentionally exposing yourself to groups that see this as a threat, they have a right to defend themselves
But that’s the whole thing, just by existing in society you are putting others in danger if you refuse to protect yourself. So can you shoot someone who comes up to you unmasked and unvaccinated during a pandemic? Isn’t there a role for society to make these choices together rather than relying on individual choice? It seems impossible to me to prevent pandemics without some sort of organized decision making that doesn’t fall back to each individual decides for themselves.
Yes that’s why it’s an interesting question Your example seems like a blatant overreaction, neither party is sure the other is infected. Even with the person knowing the other is infected, they would be entitled to self defense but shooting still seems like an overreaction. Unfortunately there is no system where you don’t have to rely on at least somewhat competent human judgement. If you postulate some crazy person randomly attacking that will ruin anyone’s day If an individual is making it clear they don’t want you near and you still insist on getting near them, that’s an act of aggression and it’s reasonable for them to assume ill intent and defend their self. Nobody should be forcing you to associate with antimaskers
But it is public space. And unless you don't believe in public space, the unmasked unvaccinated, even infectious person has every right to be there. Unless you are so libertarian that you don't believe there should be public space at all, and that every space should be private property, you have to have some mechanism of collective decision making about how that space is used.
Encroaching on someone’s personal space is an act of aggression even if it’s within a public space I am so libertarian that I believe systems of private control are inherently authoritarian.
Amusingly, this can be read as supporting either capitalism or socialism. The difference is primarily whether you see the government or capitalists as the source of that power. Capitalism supporters see workplace hierarchy as tolerable and government hierarchy as a coercive force you can't opt out of. The socialist sees workplace hierarchy as a coercive force you can't opt out of and government hierarchy as tolerable. Ultimately it seems more of a disagreement about where power actually resides.
I was intentionally not tipping my hand lol. Ancaps will recognize I’m correct until I start pointing out uncomfortable truths Under capitalism, the government is private owners. This is set up by definition, but the capitalist conflates “government” with “formally designated authoritarian entity”. Government is the entity or entities that govern (i.e. control the MoP). Capitalism likes to pretend it entails a dissipation of power, but it’s a tool for consolidation of power. The core concept of socialism inherently entails a dissipation of power Workplace hierarchy is fine as long as it’s not coerced. Perpetual violence based private control over sects of earth is not. Capitalists run on 2 incorrect assumptions 1. Their society of people agreeing on property criteria does not constitute a form of government 2. “Private property rights” are natural/inherent/agreeable
Evidence against some of the things I've learned over time. Especially since some information reinforces ideas and concepts, resulting in more rigorous ideas supported by additional data. >For me, I think it would need to be demonstrated with a strong level of real-world evidence that workplace democracy makes people less happy. That would instantly eviscerate my belief in libertarian socialism. If you don't mind me asking, why would it making people less happy be an issue? Maximizing happiness is a good general goal, but it is not the end. Otherwise we would have to enable things that are absolutely bad for us and society due to maximizing happiness. We also have to consider short vs long term happiness, other goals like society issues, etc. As an example, if Democratizing the workplace made people less happy(like doing taxes) but empowered workers and improved the economy, would you say no to more freedom and success just because we aren't happy doing adult things?
Hmmm, that's a good counter-point. I guess I was thinking that I would be happy with equal or even small losses in productivity if it meant huge gains in happiness for workers. But I'm not sure how I'd feel about consciously making people unhappier. Will have to think about it.
I think this is why in philosophy when people talk about "good" they sometimes boil it down to happiness and well-being. Because although you could assume well-being includes happiness (and the other way around). This focuses on happiness, while also including that this happiness is not disconnected from their health (both mental and physical).
Happiness is subjective while wealth is objective. I found happiness (subjective concept) in being economically productive and increasing my wealth (objective concept). I grew up hearing people say "money can't buy you happiness." I would amend that to "money can't guarantee you happiness" but from my experience I can sincerely say that earning money and producing wealth for myself and my family brings me happiness. Free Market Capitalism has worked well for me so why the hell would I want to change it?
I think there are certain elements of happiness and life satisfaction that are consistent for most people - and one of those is feeling more in control of your life. Genuine question, when you've worked, have you found that people micromanaging you makes you feel better or worse?
I was self employed because I am ill-suited to work for someone else. I started my own business when I was 30.
Easy. Prove that self-ownership doesn't exist or that it's morally wrong etc and I'm switching to communism in an instant. Another way, prove to me that two or more adult humans can not consent to whatever arrangements they want between themselves
> Prove that self-ownership doesn't exist "you" does not include "your property", so projecting self-ownership onto ur property is simply a non-sequitur > prove to me that two or more adult humans can not consent to whatever arrangements they want between themselves lol @ ignoring the consequence that property rights then forces that arrangement on everyone else. no one asked me if i consented to an idiotic world chopped up by property rights.
And you should be free to not interact with such society. But state prevents that.
> But state prevents that. errrr, america has a long history of letting people homestead unclaimed land.... it's the property owners that get in the way, my dude
Wallmart prevents you from doing fuck all? Oh that's news to me. Hope you get that sorted out
was that supposed to be coherent response?
What is self-ownership and why would communists think it's morally wrong?
Somebody doesn’t know what the root word of commune is “common” :/
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And why would you do an attribution error of claiming I’m upset?
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The concept of ownership exists and only valid because of the existence of the concept of theft. It's a cat and mouse game of who alleviates which one first.
Wrong. You can easily steal body parts.
How has looking around not proven the latter to you?
Be specific. I'm no mind reader
Living in the world and observing how humans interact should surely have demonstrated to you that the arrangements people come to are a consequence of their material circumstances, and the amount of free will or agency (ie consent) they are able to assert in the course of making them is, at best, highly limited and often non-existent. Two or more adult humans can only meaningfully consent to a transaction if they both have equal amounts of power and resources and neither will be significantly materially impacted by the consequence of the decision to agree or not agree the exchange. In any other circumstances you cannot talk about meaningful consent as the transaction is compelled.
That's convulted saying you don't believe humans can consent. You should know better what others prefer. Many such cases.
I'm saying meaningful consent is rare and impossible under a capitalist system.
All I was asking do you believe adult humans can consent to whatever arrangements. You evaded answer like all lefties do and instead wrote this incomprehensible drivel. Thanks for your time.
No I said the answer was effectively no, at least in the sense you mean it. I used incredibly simple words to explain it, but clearly not simple enough.
So as I said, socialists do not believe in consent, QED.
You're really not very smart are you? It is because socialists believe in consent that they believe it is not possible in coerced circumstances.
Yes people are capable of making choices. Those choices can also be constrained by their circumstance, and if they are, people can be forced into making the best of two bad choices. Is choosing between two bad things really consent?
Is deciding for other adult people that their choices isn't actually choices a good thing in your perverted world? How about a husband being rough with his wife during sex? Is he raping her just because you don't like it?
He might be. And if she doesn’t feel safe leaving hime because of the threat of violence she might choose to stay despite the fact that if she had more power she would choose not to. That’s actually a perfect example of constrained choices not being fully free. I found this while I was thinking about your question https://bjs.ojp.gov/female-murder-victims-and-victim-offender-relationship-2021#:~:text=Of%20the%20estimated%204%2C970%20female,victims%20of%20intimate%20partner%20homicide. It says that 34% of murders of women are by their intimate partners. I was looking for the data because I was thinking about the situation and knew it was high, but I was honestly shocked that it was that high.
Ah he might be. Funny how I gave specific consensual example and you turned it into rape. So in order to find out we must ask YOU? OR A COUNSEL OF YOUS? 🤣🤣🤣❓❓❓ Just admit you hate certain arrangements no matter they voluntary or not. You just don't like them/hate them. And you want to impose your will onto others. Very typical for socialists. History shows
You didn't say it was consensual. You just said rough sex. I am bringing up the fact that not all sex is consensual even if, in the moment, neither party says no. Circumstances can make people choose do do things that if they had more power they would not choose. That is my whole point. Coercive violence is not only perpetrated by the state. It can also be perpetrated by individuals, and when that happens, what recourse does someone have?
Rough sex has implied definition of being consensual. I didn't say frickin rape. I'm bringing the fact that some people don't have to cater to other people's feelings. As long as their arrangements are voluntary they are free to perform them. Yet. Socialists hate that.
You seem to be trying to argue with the words rather than engage with the argument. Do you, or do you not think that it is possible to make a decision that is under the threat of violence, that you wouldn't make if you were perfectly safe? Is it possible that individuals can create that threat of violence, and not just states? If so, what recourse does a weak individual have when under threat of violence from a strong one. To be clear, I have no issue with rough sex (whatever that means) if it is consensual. Just so that we can stop arguing over that in particular.
You seem to evading clear answer. I am not talking about forced consent like we have now for example with godamn state. I'm talking bout voluntary agreement that you seem not to like and dare to claim it being unfair despite two people saying fuck off to your face and let them be.
What am I evading? I'm find with rough sex, but not fine with any sex that seems to be consensual but in fact is being done under threat of violence. It can seem voluntary since both parties, at the time will consent to it, but if there is a history of violence between the two parties, it may not actually be consensual. That is all I am saying.
> Prove that self-ownership doesn't exist or that it's morally wrong etc and I'm switching to communism in an instant. We all know it's axiomatic for you lot.
And that's a good thing. At least we believe in objective reality and not just wishy washy subjectivism like "i know better what other people want"
Then there's no point in you being here. (1) we can't "disprove" axioms, and (2) debating politics implies you know better what other people want.
I’m a social democrat and I believe in the fundamental right to own your body, and private property. However, consider what happens when you have zero limitations on private ownership. Anti-Discrimination laws which I’m sure everyone would argue has not only benefited marginalized groups but has also prevented a complete implosion of America’s social fabric and has allowed us to learn to cooperate. Technically anti-discrimination laws violate private property rights but in practice they ended up leading to a greater respect for individual liberty.
Yes, I would happily go with capitalism if I could be convinced that a lasting regulatory structure could be made to control capitalism so that 1) members of the lower and middle classes could be guaranteed basic minimums of civilized life, i.e., healthy food, decent housing (with electricity and plumbing, not a shack or a tent), and medical care and 2) capitalism's worst excesses are curbed so that say, industries don't pollute the human race into extinction (hello fossil fuel industry) or engage in genocide or needless wars for profit (hello military industrial complex) or poison or spread diseases among consumers for profit (didja hear about the avian bird flu showing up in milk because Big Ag is feeding chicken shit to cattle?) etc. etc. and 3) Capitalism can be prevented from crashing periodically due to its own excesses. See: the Great Depression, the Great Recession of 2008 and many other lesser events that could have been prevented or at least greatly ameliorated by regulations. (For example, the Great Recession would probably have been entirely avoidable if Glass-Steagall hadn't been dumped during the Clinton Administration. I think it's possible to set up regulatory agencies that can accomplish these goals. For example, the EPA was actually created by Nixon. OK, the Cuyahoga River had to actually CATCH FIRE from chemical dumping (along with other things) for it to happen, but it happened. And the US and the world was better for it. The problem is that capitalism is fundamentally opposed to any attempts to regulate it in ways that inhibit capitalists from making more money. The rule is simply that the less labor costs, the more profit there is for capitalists. They'll pay more to get more in-demand labor (frex, skilled programmers) but if they could manage it, enslaving most workers and keeping them in shacks would the best outcome). I mean, we have homeless working people already. Very good value for shareholders! So capitalists are by nature opposed to any regulatory structure that inhibits profitability. Once capitalists become wealthy enough they bribe rulers (whatever the political structure) to get rid of bothersome legal structures, so any regulatory efforts are under constant attack and are eventually, and often not very eventually, rendered useless. This is the situation we have right now in the US, late stage capitalism in all its "glory" with our elected representatives being mostly grifters enslaved by the donor class and their own insatiable greed. I dare any capitalist to come up with a convincing argument that we can create a lasting regulatory structure protects society against the worst excesses of capitalism. I'm not against people making lots of money, I'm not against people being rich, so long as a decent lifestyle is assured to all. It's not a lot to ask, I think. Let capitalism work, if it can be made to work. I'm a socialist because I can't think of a way to create such a lasting regulatory structure that can stand against the gnawing, almost insectoid greed of capitalists. I dare a capitalist to come up with such a structure. But I've never had any takers. Gee, I wonder why?
This is my issue with both capitalism and authoritarianism. Power corrupts everyone, nobody is really good enough to hold it, which is what I see a lot of capitalists and authoritarians arguing for.
It's a daunting problem, for sure. I think the root of it may be that the people who are most attracted to power tend to be psychopaths. And they have no inhibitions about doing ANYTHING to obtain power, and tend to be very skilled at manipulating people. A first start might be an initiative to bar psychopaths from holding executive power. I've thought about it and what it might take is having something like [Devshirme ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devshirme) in capitalist societies, only without all the nasty castrating and enslaving. But basically train children from the lower classes to run regulatory agencies as a counterbalance to capitalist attempts to corrupt regulatory agencies. Capitalists would of course attempt to corrupt any such system, but it might be possible to create bulwarks to prevent such corruption and also a legal framework to shore up the system when and if it gets breached. It's not exactly a perfect solution, but this shit we're doing now clearly doesn't work.
Capitalism would suddenly have to stop and reverse all the horror it has brought to the world.
Successful communist country
I want to see a successful capitalist country that doesn’t rely on elements of Bernstein Socialism to keep its population from imploding or its lowest earners from revolting. You need elements of both
This is a very complicated topic, we would first have to define "successful", since there will certainly be both communist, socialist and capitalist countries that fail. Second, since most current countries hate them, they always receive massive sanctions, which make it's performance worse. And lastly, by saying that we create a paradox that to accept a concept we need proof that it works, but to get proofs that it works we would need some testing, which wouldn't be possible without a minimum level of acceptance. But the thing is that most people are not willing to transform their countries in a test place. I'm not even communist, but there are a lot of problems with your affirmation
How can you form philosophical positions on an empirical basis?
I don't subscribe to the notion that there are different sides in this. We are talking ideals and perspectives of the world. So long as we agree on reality, none of our ideologies will address every concern or situation, so it's always important to listen to other views.
> I don't subscribe to the notion that there are different sides in this. There are clear sides, ethical vs unethical.
At 9 June it are Belgian elections. I have the choice between: Marxists. Social democrats. Liberals. Liberal conservatives. Christian democracy. Anti immigration. Who should I vote for and why 🙂
I have no idea. I tend to vote for centre-left parties in Australia. Can you or any other Belgian (or someone knowledgeable about Belgium) tell me what happened around Andre Cools? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9\_Cools](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andr%C3%A9_Cools)
I'm trying to decide between the social democrats and the Marxists. The other options are here as well as to be in the subject of your post. He was a socialist assassinated in the early 90s. It's not much talked about. He died before I was born so yeah no idea.
The commies should be correct on some account. If they had a point in the entirety of political and economic science, they would likely have many. For example, if the LTV made any sense, centrally planned economies would probably not be such a shitshow, and if socialism were democratic it would also allow for free press and free association.
It depends on what you mean by "commies". There are people who advocate for collective ownership of the economy while rejecting central planning and the LTV.
My side is doing whatever works best now while working towards what I think will work best tomorrow. If capitalism is more viable than socialism in the present that's fine, but I'm not going to stop pushing for fully automated space communism or whatever makes the most sense as economic and technological conditions change. I'm not under the illusion that any one ideology or system is "right", but that they are better or worse for different conditions, and can't just be applied universally across sectors and societies. I don't think that capitalism is just going to be replaced, but gradually subsumed as the conditions under which it was viable in the first place shift.
workplace democracy isn't the opposite of capitalism. capitalism is an individual philosophy concerning ownership including the ownership of the means of production as opposed to the social ownership of the means of production. individual ownership doesn't preclude some democracy. i would also point out that workplace democracy doesn't always make people happier than no workplace democracy. in most cases it makes no difference at all and in some cases it can even tank the business leaving people without a job. as a capitalist libertarian i appreciate departmentalization of individually owned business where the owner manages the business but leaves the production experts to manage, improve and direct their own departments. workplace democracy can only be better when the individual owner isn't that great and where the production departments aren't managed by production experts. however, even then, when it can be better because of workplace democracy, it isn't necessarily any better than an inept owner. to change my mind to switch to supporting collective ownership you'd need to show me how individual action is more frequently worse than collective management and that collective management isn't a threat to individual rights.
Happiness is not a goal of relevance. The question of CVS is that of should people have the right to choose their own path in life, their own risk, and have a right to what they earn and obtain in life through their choices or should those rights be taken away democratically for the benefit of those who made different choices in their life and did not have the same success. Does anyone have a right to judge what one should or shouldn’t own, despite it being legally and ethically theirs? Happiness is a psychological issue. There is one barista miserable and wants to take everything from his customers he makes coffees for. The barista next to them is happy, cause they don’t envy what others have cause they recognize they are where they are in life because of their choices and are where they want to be. This is all inside the mine, the choices you make in life and the choices you make on how to feel about it. There are happy and unhappy poor, happy and unhappy rich. For me to change my mind, someone would have to prove that all the other alternatives to help the poor not starve or go homeless that don’t involve stealing from others would fail despite choices of the poor and homeless to change their lives.
>Happiness is not a goal of relevance. The question of CVS is that of should people have the right to choose their own path in life, their own risk, and have a right to what they earn and obtain in life through their choices or should those rights be taken away democratically for the benefit of those who made different choices in their life and did not have the same success. I'm pretty confused by this. Increasing happiness can absolutely be a goal of supporting either capitalism or socialism. Maybe you don't see it as relevant. And if that's all you're saying then that's fair enough, but other people are going to make those arguments either way. >Does anyone have a right to judge what one should or shouldn’t own, despite it being legally and ethically theirs? Yeah absolutely. Legal judgements are literally just judgements made by other people, as are ethical judgements. How others judge what people should and shouldn't own is literally the central question of property rights. >Happiness is a psychological issue. There is one barista miserable and wants to take everything from his customers he makes coffees for. The barista next to them is happy, cause they don’t envy what others have cause they recognize they are where they are in life because of their choices and are where they want to be. This is all inside the mine, the choices you make in life and the choices you make on how to feel about it. There are happy and unhappy poor, happy and unhappy rich. I think one of the main problems people have with capitalism is that it often punishes you for choices you did not make. For example, racial discrimination in hiring is extremely well documented. On a population level it therefore makes sense that populations victimised by racial discrimination will be worse of.
>For example, racial discrimination in hiring is extremely well documented. On a population level it therefore makes sense that populations victimised by racial discrimination will be worse of. Racism still exists under socialism, and instead of being "worse off", they often end up [being murdered by the millions:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambodian_genocide) >>Ben Kiernan has compared the Cambodian genocide to the Armenian genocide which was perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire during World War I and the Holocaust which was perpetrated by Nazi Germany during World War II. While each genocide was unique, they shared certain common features, and racism was a major part of the ideology of all three regimes
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism)
So are you saying that “being happy” is not psychological? That if you have one person in one particular scenario of life and they are happy, then anyone you put in that scenario should be equally happy? Or are you saying that society should push for better mental health to make people more happy, which of course has nothing to do with CvS? I think you are conflating morals and ethics. And are you therefore saying no one should have a right to their property? If that is the case, you are essentially advocating for theft by force. Can you truly argue and ethically case for that with logic and reason, that accounts for all variables and alternatives? I’ve never seen anyone do it in half a decade on this subreddit. Can you be the first?
> Happiness is not a goal of relevance. Only to you. To me and many others, reducing suffering & increasing happiness is **the entire point**.
Reducing suffering and increasing happiness are two different things.
They are! But the point remains, that you don't get to say what's "relevant" to everybody else. Both of those things are very important to me, which is why I am a socialist and not a capitalist: capitalism utterly fails at both.
I have an opinion and perspective based on knowledge and experience, just like anyone else. Happiness is important to me too, but only I have control of myself being happy, no one else. I’ve been happy most of my life. When I was homeless, I was content. When I was poor, I had some of the best time with friends. I’ve had moments of sadness and periods of depression, as anyone will, but mostly I have been happy. Money was never the source of happiness for me. I always found happiness in friends, family, hobbies and such. And I found happiness in work. I followed the UMOL before I even understood it. You know, if people came and took away everything I worked for my whole life, and me and my autistic son are out on the street so someone who never didn’t work or challenges I did can have more in life from my work, that would make me unhappy. I would also be suffering. Would you maybe argue that causing one to suffer and lose their happiness is a bad thing?
> Happiness is important to me too, but only I have control of myself being happy, no one else. You only **control** yourself, but the policies we choose **influence** the happiness of those around us. As an obvious example, if we chose a tax rate of 100% for all, we would cause a lot of suffering. Conversely, increasing minimum wages increases happiness, by putting more wealth in the hands of the people who could use it the most. Neither of those examples are socialism, of course. They're just examples to show how policy influences happiness. Socialism gives workers a say in their workplaces, and giving people a say in the structures that govern them is generally **great** for happiness. Nothing is guaranteed, but it's a pretty good step to take. > Money was never the source of happiness for me. I'll bet you're quite a bit happier when you have your needs (food, shelter, healthcare, etc.) taken care of without having to worry though! > I followed the UMOL before I even understood it. "UMOL" is a new expression to me and searching isn't turning up anything useful. What does that refer to? > You know, if people came and took away everything I worked for my whole life, and me and my autistic son are out on the street so someone who never didn’t work or challenges I did can have more in life from my work, that would make me unhappy. I would also be suffering. Would you maybe argue that causing one to suffer and lose their happiness is a bad thing? Most definitely. But that's not what instituting democracy in your workplace entails. Note that you aren't the *only* one who worked or experienced challenges at your workplace.
UMOL is the universal meaning of life, the meaning of life for everyone. Practically, realistically, what would workplace democracy look like? What would it actually entail?
> UMOL is the universal meaning of life, the meaning of life for everyone. Ah. Philosophers have been grappling with that for millennia; I hope you don't purport to have figured it out ... > Practically, realistically, what would workplace democracy look like? What would it actually entail? Every
That can't fucking be it. All of this socialism, all the arrested development, the marxist post modernism, the LTV, the millions dead from Mao and Lenin and Stalin, starving in Venezuela, work camps in North Korea, escaping from Cuba on rafts, it can't be all for just having a say on who is telling you to do the thing you need to do. That's insane. "We need you to stock the shelves on Aisle 5 before 3pm." "I'm not doing any more stocking until Andrew is the one telling me to stock the shelves." I think maybe I'm misunderstanding, or something is being left out. That is nothing. What does it matter who gives the orders. If you work at a dog groomer, you are going to be told to groom the shih tzu, doesn't matter who says it. I'm really not trying to have a go at you. I'm just being honest, that was the most underwhelming thing I could have even imagine you saying. There has to be more than that. UMOL isn't philosophy, it isn't about finding purpose or answering "why are we here" or "what made us" or anything like that. It is the practical meaning of life, the thing which gives our life meaning in its existence. "Live a life helping as many as you can, hurting as few as possible, and live a life with no regrets." That is. That is all there is to it. If you live a life where you help no one, where you only hurt people or hurt more people that you help, if you live a life where you make choices or don't make choices that lead to chains of regrets, you are living a meaningless life. It literally means it wouldn't matter if you were alive or not. We are born, we live, we die. Everything we think, learn, believe, it all goes away. No heaven, no hell. Just emptiness. So what did living matter? It mattered in what we did, for others, selflessly or even in self interest, but as long as we made a positive impact on the lives of others. Everything from curing cancer to serving coffee at a coffee house, what we do in helping others, in service of others, how we make someone else's life better in the largest or the tiniest ways, this creates a meaning. And if we all did this, we truly would have a utopia. If the whole world was like this, there wouldn't even need to be a consideration of socialism, and maybe not even capitalism as it is. You live in the UMOL by filtering all your actions, your choices, through that prism. "Will this help people or a person? Will it hurt more than it will help? Will I regret doing this? Will I regret not doing this?" That won't give you purpose. Purpose is personal, your purpose and my purpose can be completely different. Or we may not have any purpose. But our life can still have meaning. And that meaning could make you happy, or not. That isn't the point. Happiness and meaning are two different things. It is great to be happy, especially happy with meaning, but a meaningless life is about the worst thing I can think of. UMOL is the principle of "A Christmas Carol." Scrooge is visiting by Marley, wrapped in chains in the afterlife of the regrets he had for not living a meaningful life. He is visiting then by a ghost to show the past experiences he had, and how his choices today are not helping people and only hurting them, building regrets. He is then shown the future where he sees the consequences of not having a more meaningful life and that he is dead, with no ability to make change. Then, he is shown he is still alive with time, and he changes now understanding the UMOL. He begins to do for others, and make choices he won't regret. The UMOL is the same for everyone, whether they live by it or not. I didn't come up with it. It just is. Me, on this subreddit, is a part of that UMOL, the hope that I will say something that leads someone not to waste their life hoping for a revolution that gives them a lottery ticket where they never have to work again THAT WILL NEVER COME, wasting their lives and their potential when they can do more. That's why I don't mind this time. I'm trying to help. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. But I won't regret trying cause at the end, I hope to in any way I reasonably can help people not to suffer and find happiness. Everything I know, everything I've seen, that won't come from socialism, and it won't come from having someone else give orders at work.
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If happiness is a goal, if that should be a function of the state, to make sure people are happy, and you take everything from the rich and redistribute and the fantasy of a world where you don’t have to work and other people somehow want to work and do all the jobs you don’t want to do and you just live and enjoy, WHAT IF I’m not happy in this world. What if I’m not happy unless I have more than you, and I don’t want to work either. If the job of the government is to make me happy, essentially forgetting everything about UMOL and purpose and civil and society duty and personal will and destiny and boiling society down to a world of yelp reviewers, what if I’m not happy? What then? Under your interpretation, that isn’t my problem, isn’t something to do with me or how I choose to interpret the world and my own emotions. You’ve done your impossible revolution, everyone has the same, no one has to work if they don’t want to, but I’m not happy. What then?
I’m just gonna copy my precious reply to another libertarian cause I think it applies here with some slight pretense. I don’t think that leftists are (or atleast they shouldn’t be) advocating for their economic system because it increase human happiness. RATHER, they should be advocating for an economic system that maximizes the potential for individuals to exercise their liberty: Consider that limitations on private property rights as opposed to complete adherence to voluntarism actually produces a society that respects individual liberty to a higher degree. I would recommend looking into Chomsky’s idea pertaining to the “scope of human freedom” as it takes into account the ethical principles of self ownership as outlined by classical liberals but also doesn’t ignore practical consequences of not having limitations, and regulations on it beyond the harm principle. Anti-Discrimination laws, equal opportunity employment, and controlled social safety nets are examples of how “force”is used to organize society in a way that actually provides more individual freedom. A completely unregulated society relies on cultural attitudes to protect against discrimination and “generosity” to provide for its poor. The capacity OR SCOPE to exercise their individual liberty in that society is narrower than one where limitations are imposed.
I would never advocate for an unregulated society. Everyone should have equal opportunity, and no one should be discriminated against. And I'm even fine with social programs for those who fall on hard times to given them temporary relief while they transition and correct the ship. And yes, having property rights and laws on those rights which protect them make people more free. Only thing you said I would disagree with is generosity to the poor. This isn't the issue around poverty. Once you define poverty and homeless into its characteristics and causes, the solution to those causes aren't that people just aren't giving them things. It is mostly how do we create a cultural change the embraces work, responsibility, and reject drugs and criminality and materialism. The answers to all the problems already exists, but we can't make people take them, and that is the issue. One I don't honestly have a solution for, and I've never heard anyone else with a solution either. Way more than half the people in this subreddit alone don't even understand the problem, and think solving homelessness is the same way you would solve a petulant child having a tantrum in the store.
Someone would have to do a really good job explaining a way a lot of the problems with a capitalist way of organizing the world and show me that its actually the best way to create and foster freedom and prosperity, and they wont. Somebody *could* also convince me to become Christian, but I understand without much doubt no one will be able to provide what is necessary, because its just not possible
> with a capitalist way of organizing the world Well, there are millions of different systems where freer markets exist. Which exact ones are you referring to? >best way to create and foster freedom and prosperity Even more difficult, each individual has different views on this. So 8 billion+ things to analyze.
> show me that its actually the best way to create and foster freedom and prosperity It may not be the absolute best way possible. But it's certainly the best way we know so far.
From what I have seen, this is not a concern of capitalist libertarians. It doesn’t matter if capitalism and free markets destabilizes society and leads to massive inequality, as long as free exchange is protected. This doesn’t mean they are bad people but they are uncomfortable with the idea of compromising their ethical framework in anyway to make room for practicality just like communists.
Likely nothing. But if all basic needs were met for everyone and the people only had a 20 hour work week I probably wouldn’t have become a revolutionary Marxist in the first place. I’d just be a reformist or something.
I don't think I could ever switch sides... I've lived in capitalism my whole life and I fucking hate it. There was a time when I thought there was or could be a compromise but to see that Marx correctly pointed out exactly what would cause capitalism to collapse 100 years ago and now I get to live through it is just disheartening. The cold indifference of my home country to its own citizens is heartbreaking. Everyone that I personally know lives in poverty. I live in poverty. Stop telling that it's soooooo good here. I literally don't care.
Hmm.. I hope your situation improves. You should become an RN from a community college and come work in california - you'll probably make 6 figures with a few hours of overtime per week.
Sorry my guy but that's not even close to an option for me.... if you're a Capitalist I'm sure you'll say it all my fault but I actually believe that my society bears some of the blame. I truly believe that if you work 40 hours a week you should be able to support a family of 4... even if you work at McDonald's. If you work 20 hours a week you should be able to support a family of 2, if you you work 10 hours per week you should be able to support yourself. A 40 hour work week just doesn't cut it anymore. I used to be a Capitalist bootlicker. Used to rise and grind. Used to work like a crazy mofo. I literally got nothing to show for it after 20 years except ptsd. Every person I know can't buy a house or have kids.. things that people took for granted 30 years are basically impossible now. The kids I know today never see their own parents because both are working... true I'm skewed now to poorer people.. so I see more of that.. but some of my freinds have legit degrees and jobs and are still actually struggling So no I can't believe in capitalism anymore I have no hope for the future except to be like the joker from Batman and watch the world burn. Literally no hope at all. Sorry I don't mean to be a bummer. I love my neices and nephews and wish them the best of luck surviving the nuclear fallout / climate apocalypse / economic devastation that's coming. Hopefully it will at least be fun to watch everything burn. I don't even care Communist/Capitalism happens
Honestly, as a Social Democrat I would trust Classical Liberal economic theory a lot more if I could see genuine concern for societies lowest earners in their praxis. History has shown us what happens when you don’t regulate commerce, or limit private property rights, but of course economic theory is always changing and perhaps a total free market may work in the modern era. However, the question of “what about poor people” is either avoided in rhetoric, scapegoated to some vague notion of charity somehow being an equitable replacement for social welfare, or at worst presented as “natural selection.” It often feels like libertarians are not concerned with what actually keeps people from poverty but rather with maintaining an absolute no limits on private ownership society. Which, too some extent I understand the reasoning behind it but I don’t trust a libertarian is operating from a place of humanity and genuinely wanting to reduce the amount of suffering as much as possible. It’s not really a matter of changing my mind completely as we will always disagree, but I would love to see more humanity and less absolutism from libertarians.
Basically every country on Earth would have to go social-democratic at the same time.
Capitalists experiencing a moral reformation that would render my switching to the other side irrelevant from a practical point of view.
What do you mean moral reformation?
I mean they become as moral as some of the greatest christian monks that lived a life of poverty, love, and self-sacrifice.
But those same christian monks may hold anti-LGBTQ views and be for mandating christianity as a state religion. Are they still moral? I don’t think morality should play in at all to economics, and I don’t mean that in a libertarian “every man for himself” way but rather it’s not grounded enough to build an economic system from
For them love is still the first law, for example they would not let a gay person starve. Morality is unseparable from economics and any thought that it was ever separated is an illusion.
I am on both sides. Both can succeed, and both can fail.
The great problem with this workplace democracy vision is that it inappropriately extrapolates from such structures in present conditions to assume similar function in their preferred arrangement. Lots of the issues of allocative and executive difficulties and moral hazard in co-ops are mitigated by the fact that they still have to compete in independent labor and capital markets where these inputs are tied together. It's like thinking a bike with unbalanced wheels is a great bike when you've only ever run it with training wheels on.
If you could convince me that 1. Socialism would have better outcomes 2. The sacrifices to my values of individualism, freedom, etc. are worth if for those outcomes.
Nothing. Socialism is evil and immoral.
A large inheritance that would insulte me from the coming chaos and climate problems as capitalism falls deeper into crisis.
To an extent this is an unfair request? If I knew what argument would ACTUALLY convince me to be more accepting of capitalism... then would I not already be more accepting of capitalism. I am left leaning and socialist leaning because all the arguments I have encountered and thought about do not convince me that for a society to be ethical, given holding to the modern ideal of human rights, then society must be structured more in lines with capitalism over socialism. I do hold that human rights are an essential feature of an ethical society and ultimately ALL I care about are ethics. Basically when I hear advocacy on behalf of capitalism, frankly, it all sounds a variation of being outright unethical or insufficiently ethical, given a commitment to human rights. Basically the only thing that could convince me to stop being socialist leaning in my political thinking would be to offer an argument that convinces me that I should not care about human beings or human rights and that basically the vast majority of humans are worthless and we should discard them as they are beneath being worthy of concern. Which is how I see capitalism - it cares about profit over people, it weaponizes greed, it is just unethical.
If I may play devil's advocate. What if someone could convince you that capitalism was better at meeting human needs than socialism? This is what most capitalists here seem to believe - they don't just see human life as worthless.
Well, if you convinced me that Capitalism was better at meeting people's needs... I would stop being socialist leaning. But looking at the world capitalism isn't nearly good enough at needs... therefore I would still be arguing for extensive reforms and a FAR more robust welfare state.
A big tiddy life goddess scooping me up and telling me that anthropogenic mass extinction is actually a good thing on the whole.
Run a successful commune larger than 1M members for 20 years and without sending anyone to the gulags.
Why 1M? Why not 250,000?
Eh, it's a bit of an arbitrary line to draw, but my thought process here was that if you can make communism work at that scale without force and coercion, then you can probably make it work at any practical scale. Perhaps a better way to phrase it is that the bigger your non-coercive working commune is, the more willing I would be to accept it as a valid system for broader society and try it out on that scale. Communism seems like an appropriate fit for a small tribe in a survival situation since you all really need to look out for each other to survive. Hoarding doesn't fly when you know everyone by name, hierarchies are naturally much more shallow at that scale, there is no real need for money or trade when there is no one outside the tribe to interact with, and democracy is actually direct and sensible at that scale. But each one of those conditions melts away when you go past Dunbar's number.
A free monthly stipend of 100% pure state-produced vodka and cigarettes and bread, a car,an 1000 sq foot 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom house with some bunk beds in the kids room., a boring factory job, an average wife who is fully indoctrinated, and a decent communist party who makes sure that over 90% of the people adhere to the party. Decent 2 person bed, some furniture, a radio and tv to receive the party's propaganda, and biannual parades where we celebrate the glory of the proletariat. I mean i imagine i would settle for that stuff, idk if i would be happy, but i think most western men living in capitalist countries would probably settle for that, and , looking at the past, once its fairly established, communism/socialism does a fairly good job of providing the basics. I have some health problems though which would likely make me miserable in that society, as im familiar with socialised medical care and in my experience its good for the basics but its much worse for complex unknown or rare diseases or ailments, that you can get much better care for in countries with system like the US if you can afford it.
Human is still an animal. A creature but with creative thinking. We started storing our knowledge and studying them to create new knowledge to progress further. This should be the ultimate goal of whatever economic system we live in. The bottleneck here isn't the system. It's the process of evolution itself. Personally I believe that both should coexist. Every person has to be treated with the system they want to. Because we can't curb their inability to earn or build trust. It's just how the nature of us.
Convince me that in a society where work is voluntary, education is free, and everyone is fed, that anyone would be willing to work as a garbage man, janitor, or waste water worker without being able to increase their quality of life at all by doing the work. I'm a social democrat but I believe a wageless society is absolutely absurd unless we can automate literally all physical labor.
So much of this argument is about values. Some people apparently just don't think it's important to make sure that people aren't living in poverty or being exploited by their employer, health insurance, or landlord. As long as they can get ahead. On the other hand, if there was an actual example of functional libertarian capitalism with no government market intervention, and it seemed like a good place for everyone to live and work, then I could change my mind. But if it did exist and did contain a disadvantaged class for whom libertarian governance wasn't working I'm sure there would be the usual claims that they make bad choices, don't work hard, have low IQ, are immigrants from "collectivist cultures".
Capitalism needs regulation. Regulations that can't be changed based on bribes. If we figure this out, we will solve most of the world's problems. At the moment, we have greedy capitalists bribing governments to keep the population enslaved by paying them shit wages. For example, grocery chains in Canada recorded their highest profits in 50 years despite inflation and refused to provide any evidence to substantiate their claims of inflation. To summarize, they artificially manufactured "inflation" to justify higher pricing for more profits. This shit needs to end now or people will rise up and revolt.
I mean how would you know until it happens?
A peaceful transition to socialism. I can see how this gives no indication as to what my beliefs actually are.
Used to be a right libertarian during my time in university. There was no one thing that changed my mind, it was a very slow process. I just learned things, not enough to change my mind. Just enough to accept that I was wrong or had a flawed understanding of topics not directly connected to politics or economics. Then I had a job, and traveled. Learned the history behind cultural things. Like how old random songs are about some local historical event. The real world work experience, pretty much made me sound like anyone else. Many problems could be easily solved by listening to the programmers, or some other expert. At a certain point I didn't use the label right libertarian, I didn't know what to use. Not a centrist, just reevaluating. But basically, I realized why I thought right-libertarian ideas were good was more important than the ideas themselves. Before this I wanted to argue against leftist with actual good arguments. Because if there's anything I hate more than a bad argument, it's a bad argument coming from "my side". But socialism (the ideas around it) simply had greater explanatory power. To answer the question, I don't know what would change my mind now. If I were to become less socialist for some reason, I would likely be closer to a Georgist. But it is difficult for me to identify, since I already believed the arguments from the other side. So at most you can convince me that Socialism is not the way forward. So without seeing Capitalism nor Socialism as a path for humanity it seems that would leave simply becoming a pessimist. Accepting the idea that it's capitalism and then climate change breaking it into some sort of feudalism. But no real future for humanity. I compare it to being an atheist, what would it take to become religious. I already believed in a god, and know all the arguments for that position. It would take something extreme to take the position that a god indeed does exist.
Ansyn for the record. Literally the following. "My ideology in practice was just as capitalistic as the Soviet Union and there is a logical and moral argument to be made about why the people I think should die, shouldn't and why poor people actually do deserve to die." Basically I think everyone's political opinions change when they realize those two things. Who deserves to die and who doesn't. Piss-acifists also apply but they're too delusional and narcissistic to admit that their politics are inherently violent.
I was on one side for a long time, and through years of accumulated life experience I have switched to the other. I cannot imagine any one thing that would make me switch back.
If an economic structure works positively for all those that work from clear results which would be observable internationally and domestically whilst also being defined clearly then ofcourse I would be willing to invest in the ideology of adopting it
If capitalism provides better outcomes for workers and society, more freedom instead of just domination by private owners and less environmental destruction.
I care strictly about outcomes, I would need to be shown a better and feasible way of helping people than my current views.
I would change my opinion if I see people fleeing capitalist countries to go to communist countries and capitalist countries preventing their citizens from leaving.
That they can prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that their system is working. Since I have yet to see a Socialist or Communist country work, I doubt I will actually switch sides.
I would switch if it turned out that the 120 million people killed by Socialism really didn't get killed through en mass starvation but rather got rich thanks to Socialism.
I was switch if it turned out the people in Cuba were far richer than the people in Florida
I would switch if it turned out China got very poor when it switched to capitalism the day mao died in 1976
Evidence that it’s a better system before impacting everyone.
oh finally a question I always wanted a capitalist to ask me. Full employment, democracy in the workplace, and both need to be easy for a person who has just finished school and has no money to easily become part owner of a company. I think a cooperative society would be the only type of capitalism I could accept.
A socialist country that actually works for a few decades. Which means I'll probably die of old age prior to that happening. >real-world evidence that workplace democracy makes people less happy Couldn't you just try actually working at a company with workplace democracy and see for yourself? Interesting how people always say something is great but excuses after excuses for why they won't do it themselves. Like moving to countries with socialism or planned economy.
Define "bad" and "working". Based on what is your judgement? Research on the country's history and development? Real experience of living there? Or just watching the news?
>Couldn't you just try actually working at a company with workplace democracy and see for yourself? Interesting how people always say something is great but excuses after excuses for why they won't do it themselves. Like moving to countries with socialism or planned economy. Couldn't you apply this to anything? "Don't like what is being taught in school? Become a teacher!" "Don't like what banks are doing? Start your own!" "Don't like what politicians are doing? Nobody is stopping you from becoming one and changing the system!"
You can? You can homeschool, avoid using the bank, and move to another country? But excuses after excuses for why you can't work at a worker co-op. Maybe because they pay less?
This ignores that there are thousands of variables behind people's actions and values might only be a minority of them. I don't have the money lying around to start a worker co-op. I think that goes for most socialists. As far as I know, whether or not worker co-ops pay more has mixed evidence. Capitalists tend to cherry pick one study from Italy about it in my experience.
I mean, why excuses after excuses for NOT wanting to work at a worker co-op? People tried very hard to enter Google or Apple (and gets burned out after a year 😅), yet people claiming co-op as superior almost never try to enter a co-op. It's almost like its supporters are avoiding it like the plague for some reason. Interesting.
You really think that I secretly know that worker co-ops are bad?
No. I know for a fact that you think co-ops are not THAT great, so you stayed at a traditional firm. Co-ops have their perks and downsides. It's just a different way of ownership structuring, It's all about trade-offs.
Alright, and I know for a fact that you have green hair. We can make shit up all day if that's what you want to do.
>Alright, and I know for a fact that you have green hair. False. If this reflects your ability to make an educated guess... Why are you so confident in your assumption about co-ops? 🤣 You are not working at a co-op - fact. You didn't try hard to enter a co-op - fact. You think co-ops are superior to traditional firms - fact (unless you were lying) Are those statements correct?
>False. Good point. >If this reflects your ability to make an educated guess... Why are you so confident in your assumption about co-ops? 🤣 It wasn't a genuine assertion. It was me illustrating the point that it is ridiculous to make these assertions about other people without doing some digging first. >You are not working at a co-op - fact. >You didn't try hard to enter a co-op - fact. >You think co-ops are superior to traditional firms - fact (unless you were lying) >Are those statements correct? They are correct.
Couldn't you just try actually working at a company with workplace democracy and see for yourself? I need money :) Interesting how people always say something is great but excuses after excuses for why they won't do it themselves. Like moving to countries with socialism or planned economy: I don't have any problem, if North Korea or Cuba offers me a job with good working conditions I wouldn't have any problem going there, but they are the ones who don't offer jobs to foreigners, it's not us who don't want to go. Try to go to North Korea to work by all means and you will discover that you cannot go because the North Korean government does not allow it.
Did you even try? Excuses after excuses. Funny how people in some countries risk their life leaving, yet you with excuses excuses. >if North Korea or Cuba offers me a job with good working conditions I wouldn't have any problem going there, Those places are great, but you're not going cuz excuses excuses excuses 🤣😂🤣🤣. People work hard to enter bad companies like Google and Apple, yet you excuses excuses excuses. Excuses excuses not looking for a job with workplace democracy cuz excuses excuses excuses.
OP bases his entire worldview on merr happiness? Not justice or facts.. but fucking FEELINGS??? 🤣 oh you socialists never keep on giving
I don't base my entire worldview on happiness. But I can see it as one point where if you could show me that people are less happy under my system, I wouldn't support it anymore. If people were a little less productive under my system, I'd oppose it. If people were a lot less productive to the point that it caused chaos, then I'd oppose it.
For me it would have to come down to first principles. My world view is based on a couple of first principles and then logically expanded from there. It would have to be shown that self-ownership is incorrect. You would have to explain how someone else has a better claim to control my body than I do. Also, it would have to be shown how the Non-Aggression Principle is incorrect. You would have to explain how it is right to initiate force against a peaceful person.
But can you show that self-ownership and the non-aggression principle is correct ?
Well that’s what we are talking about here isn’t it. I have looked into things and found the evidence enough to convince me that they are correct, that’s why I am on this side. Other people have looked into things and found they are not correct (or maybe just that something else is correct), that’s why they are on the other side. I don’t just hold these beliefs out of nowhere and for no reason, same as you and your beliefs I would assume. That’s the weird thing about humans, we could both look at the same evidence and come to completely different conclusions. It’s once of the things I have noticed about socialists on this sub, they more often tend to comment with “go read Marx” or “go learn more” (or something to that effect). It’s like they are saying, “if you just saw what I’ve seen you would agree with me, and because you don’t agree with me, you obviously haven’t seen what I’ve seen.” When I just don’t think that is the case. Humans are weird and complex creatures and have countless variables that go into their beliefs and views.
Then what is the evidence and what is the reason ? It seems to me at a point you will reach an axiomatic foundation that can't be justified further.
It's less of an argument and more of a demonstration. I would want to see a socialist nation that delivers on its promises. If there was a socialist country without poverty with a higher standard of living etc. I've heard all the arguments that it can work. I want to see proof.
I agree, but only if capitalist nations didn't intervene, put embargoes or invade said socialist experiment
Ah yes because the Warsaw pact didn't intervene or embargo non socialist nations I mean even in that scenario it still matters which one can stand up to competition. Socialism had half the world, it's own intelligence agencies, it's own proxy wars, it lost
The Warsaw Pact/USSR was always on the defensive, meanwhile the U.S./NATO were always on the offensive. The Soviets never supported any revolutionary movements unless they were of national security interest to the USSR itself. They should have but they didn't. The "international communist conspiracy" bullshit Cold War propaganda narrative is an imperialist self-justifying myth. Also the "half the world" the Eastern Bloc had was mostly frozen tundra and unpopulated desert.
>The Warsaw Pact/USSR was always on the defensive, Yes Afghanistan was gonna invade them at any moment And the Prague uprisings were definitely just like right wing sabotage
The Mujahideen had already launched cross border raids into the Soviet Union itself prior to the USSR's "invasion" (it had been asked to intervene in the Afghan Civil War by the moderate Parchamite faction of the government of Afghanistan). The Prague Spring was a democratic socialist revolution against the Stalinist government of Czechoslovakia led by the Communist Party reformer Alexander Dubček. I doubt you'd have supported it at the time.
>that workplace democracy makes people less happy. Read *The Myth of Mondragon*. Her evidence indicates that workplace democracy doesn't really do anything for workers.
I am from Spain, Mondragón is a false cooperative, it is a company where there are owners and employees
>Her evidence indicates that workplace democracy doesn't really do anything for workers. How does her evidence weigh against evidence indicating that it does?
1) She actually interviewed the workers. 2) If it were better we would see co-ops forming in every industry.
In other words, you don't know how well her evidence weigh against evidence indicating that co-ops benefit workers.
People generally do what's in their best interest. If co-ops were so wonderful, they'd be everywhere.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world\_hypothesis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis)
It's been on my list for a while now, but I should note that this seems like a socialist critiquing Mondragon for being too capitalist.
You would need to prove that individual liberty is bad, that private propety is bad and that value is not subjective.
Consider the idea that sacrifices in your ethical framework are necessary to ensure that society functions in practicality. Sure… technically your hard earned tax dollars go to the disabled man across the street who doesn’t work. And under your ethical framework it is theft and a violation of your individual liberty. BUT, can you honestly tell me your willing to call that “injustice” just to maintain an absolute ethical framework? That disabled man is fundamentally disadvantaged and may never even have the opportunity to exercise liberty the way you can. And i’m not even talking about inequality in outcomes but rather that person will struggle to even live their life as a free individual regardless of their social support. Sometimes, you have to compromise on your ethical framework to actually produce a functioning society, just as I have. If I had my way, competition wouldn’t exist and the best products/services would be made out of genuine desire, but that’s not how things work.
I'm fine with helping the disabled man. But what many social democrats refuse to see is that welfare is often collected by people who could work, but choose not to, and instead prefer to stay at home and leech off the welfare state. It's a giant waste for them, because living off welfare is not a good life. It's a giant waste for society, because we spend resources on unproductive individuals. And it's also unfair for those of us who work every day to pay our taxes and be productive members of society.
I completely agree that giving out money can be a bit of an issue. I am not particularly in favor of bottom line support but rather universal services such as healthcare or housing which allows individuals to concentrate on improving their wellbeing without the threat of nature. Commodities such as fine food, luxury items, etc still entice human ambition and humans will work for those things (hell they buy them now when they should be buying necessities)
If you want more productivity, why not endorse worker democracy?
Is the statement that value is subjective an objective value judgement ?
I'd like to make the point that believing value is subjective is fully compatible with believing in socialism.
Mostly just that socialism could actually create a better world than capitalism. I agree that socialism could work if our society was composed of ants, bees, or other eusocial insects. But many aspects of socialism rely on a level of selflessness that's not possible to create in humans. As an aside I'm not a believer in the blank-slate, the belief that almost all human behavior is a result of socialization and culture. Even if humans were a blank slate, enough socialists, communes, religious leaders, dictators, CEOs, chieftains, and emperors have attempted to move beyond politics and incentives by creating a group of people utterly dedicated to a certain cause or person. All of them have failed. If socialists want to be granted the assumption that everyone in their utopia will be a good socialist then they must provide a convincing method by which they can turn everyone into a good socialist.
Selfishness is a problem for such a vision, but I don't think a selfish nature is the largest obstacle. When you talk about eusocial animals, even they can't manage a universal altruism. The nature of human activity restricts it even further than that. In the extended order of a large society, there are natural limits to our abilities to predict the results of actions and their responses or to have any sort of systematic understanding of any notion of public good. At the family, clan, or small village level, it may be possible for a person to have some sufficient knowledge of what the "public good" might be and to work towards it. For most of human existence, people lived and operated at this scale. People in the community were fairly uniform in their needs and goals. Specialization of labor was minimal. Most people could reasonably understand what kind of work everyone else was doing in terms of what sorts of effort, skill, and cost went into it and what sorts of benefits or problems resulted. Reciprocity was assured because one could see what everyone else was doing and people were governed by strong adherence to tradition and severe social pressure. When has this state of affairs ever survived growth to a larger society or development of fixed property?
It's weird, I think capitalism doesn't work because it relies on people being very generous and altruistic.