What's Wrong With Communism?

[mrcomment]

talking about ideas and stuff is great intellectual exercise, communism is a great idea and all but...

we have to work on the examples we have when we are talking about introducing those ideas into life.

and the facts are, nobody did it properly and it always led to a creation of a totalitarian state. as a citizen of Poland, a country that, with all due respect, had more to do with the ussr than uk, usa and other western countries, i had to say that communism sucked.

Let's make a quick mental experiment and talk about what would happen if this site turned communist (quick steps):

1. the site employees revolt and ban the old owners (imprison etc). new owners chosen from among the loudest of the revolutionaries.

2. new owners call themselves the leaders and talk about sharing and common goods, old admins and mods are banned (all of them), new ones chosen by the leaders from their retinue

3. any user rebelling against the new order (by for example, expressing his doubts) is banned, tracked by the ip number, his e mail accounts are banned, he cant access his bank account etc, finally internet connection taken away

4. couple of months pass, people start to wonder what changed, so the leaders pick people at random to ban. at the root of the communist state is the existence of an enemy (well, not restricted to communist states, really )

figure out the rest.

Myself, I'm enjoying capitalism with all its flaws at the moment. At least we can talk about them.

 

[riskroWe]

I'm opposed to communism largely because I hate other human beings, and the idea of a society where everyone coexists peacefully makes me sick.

 

[Lexodus]

If it doesn't work in practice then something is obviously wrong with the theory.

Just that it banks on humans having a conscience, which shouldn't be too much to ask.

 

[RYjet911]

Eh, Communism is pretty mediocre...

Panarchy for the win!

 

[The Infamous Scamola]

If it doesn't work in practice then something is obviously wrong with the theory.

Well put. This is the first intelligent thing I've read all day.

Anyway, extremism is stupid, whether it be left-wing or right-wing.

 

[Reklore]

If you had read the Communist manifesto instead of just listening to anti-commie propaganda you would know you could do all those things.

But how? Everything has to be shared equally... how can anyone be an individual in that situation if all is equal? That is what confuses me on the subject.

That's where the American anti-communist propaganda shows it's ugly head.

You fear having your individuality taken away by a communist government.

But that's not what communism does.

It's not "Make everyone the same", it's "Make no one better than anyone else".

Your individuality remains intact, and you can do as you wish, so long as everyone is equal (not the same, just equal).

Finally, it's the perfect system on paper, but in practice it doesn't work as well as it should.

Just like every other political schema in history.

How do you stop people from became higher than someone without taking away there in individuality and freedom?

To be all equal, we would have to have the same job, and it wouldn't be the good jobs, it will be the mosted basic job, like working in a rice field

 

[Kair]

The reason people think Communist Socialism does not work is because it is used as a last resort in poor and unstable countries, so they think that Communism is the reason that the country is fucked up, while actually it is an enormous improvement from what they had before. Communism has actually never worsened the state of a country, capitalism has, many, many times. Capitalism works for the ones holding the capital, the rest are their servants.

They also think Communism would not work because of it relies on people being nice. Have they ever thought about what Communist Socialism is for? Russia didn't have Communism, it had a pretty poorly executed Communist Socialist system.
Also, Socialism does not equal dictatorship, and Capitalism does not equal democracy, if you're stupid enough to believe so.

Socialism is meant to demonize greed, and in one day, let children grow up in a society without knowing greed or totally repressing it, just as we do not think it is OK to go rape a woman on the street just because we think she looks attractive. Sure, there will be deficits, but without a law and order system corrupted to protect and serve the rich, powerful and dishonest, they will be swiftly taken care of.

That is when Communism makes an entrance, when greed is so repressed and private property is a thing of the past. The grass you walk on is everyone's grass. Don't confuse this with personal possessions, the bike you ride is yours because you require it for transportation frequently, but you cannot claim to own a house if you have no intention of ever living in it.

All this after only ~500 years of socialism.
+ Socialism will not fry this planet. Yes, I'm talking about YOU, mindless consumers.

 

[TZer0]

So really, what's wrong with Communism?

1. A communistic state is self-contradictory. It has a ruling-class even though communism as a theory doesn't allow this.
2. Communism gives too much power to the state, power that is incorrectly used. Say for instance: planned-economics. You map out what you think the entire nation is going to use for the next year and produce exactly that. What happens then if a really cold winter strikes and you've only made 1 million fur coats for those in the coldest areas when suddenly your entire nation is now freezing? Which brings us to the next point..
3. Shortages and queues. My mother is from a previously communistic country and I've heard quite a lot about what standing in a queue was back then. We should stop whining about 5 minute-waiting time at the supermarkets - back then, you could be standing in queues for hours just to get toilet paper or shoes. Also, the shortages were ludicrous, some created by the rationing system itself which is often issued in communistic states (not that it wasn't issued elsewhere). Rationing systems create a false need of items, thus making everyone buy them. Everywhere where they removed the meat-rationing-system, the meat consumption per inhabitant went down.

Joke:
Q: What would happen if Sahara came under communistic control?
A: nothing for 50 years, then a sand-shortage would arise.

I might come up with more arguments soon, I don't have time to write them all down right here and now.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

The average American believes that Communism allows the other guy to live the easy life on his dime, which directly conflicts with the average American's desire of living the easy life on someone else's dime.



Seriously, though, go listen to someone complain about welfare mothers while they're standing in line to buy lottery tickets. The amount of subsurface hypocracy is stunning.

And as many others have said: Communism is an excellent idea until you start letting human beings muck around with it.

 

[Kair]

talking about ideas and stuff is great intellectual exercise, communism is a great idea and all but...

we have to work on the examples we have when we are talking about introducing those ideas into life.

and the facts are, nobody did it properly and it always led to a creation of a totalitarian state. as a citizen of Poland, a country that, with all due respect, had more to do with the ussr than uk, usa and other western countries, i had to say that communism sucked.

Let's make a quick mental experiment and talk about what would happen if this site turned communist (quick steps):

1. the site employees revolt and ban the old owners (imprison etc). new owners chosen from among the loudest of the revolutionaries.

2. new owners call themselves the leaders and talk about sharing and common goods, old admins and mods are banned (all of them), new ones chosen by the leaders from their retinue

3. any user rebelling against the new order (by for example, expressing his doubts) is banned, tracked by the ip number, his e mail accounts are banned, he cant access his bank account etc, finally internet connection taken away

4. couple of months pass, people start to wonder what changed, so the leaders pick people at random to ban. at the root of the communist state is the existence of an enemy (well, not restricted to communist states, really )

figure out the rest.

Myself, I'm enjoying capitalism with all its flaws at the moment. At least we can talk about them.

You confuse communism with communist socialism, you confuse democracy and free speech as a part of capitalism, and you confuse a shitty authoritarian execution of communist socialism with communist socialism overall.

 

[rossatdi]

Theory of communism (using the Star Trek analogy):

1) There will be a point in the future wherein man will not have to labour for the majority of his time to be able to comfortably sate his hunger, thirst, need for shelter, entertainment and so on. The capitalist basic fact of finite resources and infinite wants is conquered (Star Trek's infinite power + replicators).

2) At this point money becomes an irrelevance because people can have or do whatever they want. (There's no money in the Federation).

3) A social shift must occur whereby people derive social status not by their material wealth (as it is at the moment) but by their 'work'. Whether this be as a simple craftsman, a farmer or a doctor - a status derived from the quality of their work or the service it gives to society. (Or in the case of star trek, federation officers.)

===

Why communism doesn't work in real life is because there is no way of generating enough with little work (yet). Also think about the societies that have tried it, they all ignored the starting point, the triumph over finite resources.

 

[obex]

Well, I like being an individual. I like being able to go to the grocery store and decide what I'm having for dinner. I like being able to create artwork and play music with the things that I own. I like being on the internet.

In short, I like being able to decide my quality of life.

If I really thought that humanity could just drop everything and coexist, than I would be for it. The fact that I know it can't makes me quite sad.

Maybe you should look up what communist means i think you opened the wikipidea page for the Borg by accident.

The sad thruth is that a communist society makes it very easy for a dictatorship to occur, also in our complex world its very hard to reach equilibrium for all people and get it so that we all do the same work load.

However there are some things we can do such as stop paying actors and spots stars such ridicules amounts of money sure they should be paid and if there good at what they do it should be a good wage but it shouldn't be the most lucrative job on the planet.

 

[Vacuous Mind]

Communism's goal of a equal society in my opinion is not a bad thing, it is the way Communist state try's (or as the case may be, not to execute this) which in my opinion makes the political idea bad. Also their can never be a equal society with one main leader, and many past communist states are pretty much dictatorships.

 

[The Infamous Scamola]

So really, what's wrong with Communism?

1. A communistic state is self-contradictory. It has a ruling-class even though communism as a theory doesn't allow this.
2. Communism gives too much power to the state, power that is incorrectly used. Say for instance: planned-economics. You map out what you think the entire nation is going to use for the next year and produce exactly that. What happens then if a really cold winter strikes and you've only made 1 million fur coats for those in the coldest areas when suddenly your entire nation is now freezing? Which brings us to the next point..
3. Shortages and queues. My mother is from a previously communistic country and I've heard quite a lot about what standing in a queue was back then. We should stop whining about 5 minute-waiting time at the supermarkets - back then, you could be standing in queues for hours just to get toilet paper or shoes. Also, the shortages were ludicrous, some created by the rationing system itself which is often issued in communistic states (not that it wasn't issued elsewhere). Rationing systems create a false need of items, thus making everyone buy them. Everywhere where they removed the meat-rationing-system, the meat consumption per inhabitant went down.

Joke:
Q: What would happen if Sahara came under communistic control?
A: nothing for 50 years, then a sand-shortage would arise.

I might come up with more arguments soon, I don't have time to write them all down right here and now.

I agree with this man.

I also find the vast amount of hammer and sickle avatars disturbing.

 

[obex]

How do you stop people from became higher than someone without taking away there in individuality and freedom?

To be all equal, we would have to have the same job, and it wouldn't be the good jobs, it will be the mosted basic job, like working in a rice field

Or we could do different jobs for different lengths of times however this is the main problem with communism so i think some people have already said that in the future when there is less manual work to be done due to technology then communism may be practical.

 

[Zuljiin]

It's a lovely idea that won't work. Besides, Obama could never turn it into a communistic country. A socialistic country, yes, but to become communistic, there needs to be a revolution. Atleast... I think so.

 

[Kair]

So really, what's wrong with Communism?

1. A communistic state is self-contradictory. It has a ruling-class even though communism as a theory doesn't allow this.
2. Communism gives too much power to the state, power that is incorrectly used. Say for instance: planned-economics. You map out what you think the entire nation is going to use for the next year and produce exactly that. What happens then if a really cold winter strikes and you've only made 1 million fur coats for those in the coldest areas when suddenly your entire nation is now freezing? Which brings us to the next point..
3. Shortages and queues. My mother is from a previously communistic country and I've heard quite a lot about what standing in a queue was back then. We should stop whining about 5 minute-waiting time at the supermarkets - back then, you could be standing in queues for hours just to get toilet paper or shoes. Also, the shortages were ludicrous, some created by the rationing system itself which is often issued in communistic states (not that it wasn't issued elsewhere). Rationing systems create a false need of items, thus making everyone buy them. Everywhere where they removed the meat-rationing-system, the meat consumption per inhabitant went down.

1. It is communist socialism you are speaking of, not communism.
2. Would capitalism have psychic powers to predict that and have fur coats for every single person ready?
3. Russia had a pretty shitty communist socialism, with no criticism from the populace allowed. When you look at the history of Russia, you might find out that almost nothing would work in Russia.
You are trying to say that every communist socialist system would be like this, with no criticism allowed from the populace. This is just ignorant.
Capitalism has 500 years of trial and error behind it, and is still fucked up for 90% of its users. Communist Socialism had little to no trial and error, and still managed to improve countries that were FUBAR. Look at Russia today, would you say capitalism is better for Russia than the very shitty Communist Socialism they had?

 

[TankCopter]

Most of the people calling him a Communist seem to miss the point of Communism. Obama is taking a Socialist approach in a Capitalist country, and people are afraid of it. The American public elected him to make change, but not too much change! As an Ausie with a ringside seat, I say he's onto a good thing.

On Topic: Communism as an idea is lovely, and in a perfect world, it would work. However, we humans have messy things like personalities and habits which get in the way of a truly equal society. The rich want to stay rich and the politicians like the control they have. In terms of ideals, nothing is wrong with Communism, it's just that it has a history of not working in practice.

 

[mrcomment]

You confuse communism with communist socialism, you confuse democracy and free speech as a part of capitalism, and you confuse a shitty authoritarian execution of communist socialism with communist socialism overall.

There are no separate ideas, but sets used in specific instances. There is no pure communism just there are no pure democracies or authoritarian states without additional elements.

Imho, talking about separate trends and stuff is purely academic. In order to introduce their versions of communism countries had to go by with cenzorship, banning free speach and all.

Show me a communistic country that did without negative set of ideas.