• Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    15
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Socialists don’t hate markets, they hate workers not having any power or democratic choice in how they interact in the market.

    Workers owning the means of production just means the workers are doing the same work but they are in ownership of the factory and the profits. They will still sell the products they produce in a marketplace.

    • hglman@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      I, a socialist, hate markets. They are simplistic and functional artifacts of the available way to pass information.

      • wewbull@feddit.uk
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        So, you would never trade with someone else something you have for something they have? You want to be entirely self sufficient?

        If this isn’t true, why do think markets serve no purpose?

      • galloog1@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        Cool, what is your preferred replacement and does everyone in this thread agree? You have managed to continue criticism but not offer a replacement yet again.

        • hglman@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          The ole can have criticism without perfect solutions response. Cool, how useless and pointless of you.

            • bloodfart@lemmy.ml
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              0
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              No, it broadens and deepens understanding.

              Alternatives come from that understanding. Criticism is the fundamental step towards alternatives.

              • agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                No, it broadens and deepens understanding

                How exactly do you come to that conclusion?

                Edit: “Thing bad” doesn’t broaden or deepen anything. “Thing has specific shortcomings which aren’t present in specific alternative to thing” is a useful criticism. Criticism without alternatives is just called complaining.

    • Wanderer@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      How would that even work.

      It’s very very easy to do something like have a capitalist system where business and the rich are taxed. But you aren’t on about that.

      You could divide everything up today. But with change and new business ideas that system will never work. You think the people would want to invest in new automation, new ways of working, new industries. If it means growth and job losses? No never. Just look at the western car industry, or any big government owned industry. People don’t want change, even things like running a factory 24/7 instead of a nice 9-5 is difficult.

      Then Japan’s comes along and does all this new stuff and puts most of the western workforce out of business.

      • TheFascination@beehaw.org
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        If worker-owned workplaces still operate within a market, there will still be pressure to compete with other companies. People can still come up with new ideas to compete and change can still happen.

    • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      Do they actually trust their coworkers to run the company without tanking it almost immediatly? Most of my coworkers can barely make it through their own tasks without fucking something up, let alone actually having input on how the business is run.

      • PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Some of the workers may be managerial. But the managerial workers don’t own a disproportionate amount of the company, and they’re not considered the “superior” of any other workers.

        • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          I think they have education related to the running of a large company whereas most of my coworkers barely made it through their IT certs and have some of the stupidest takes regarding how things should be done I’ve ever heard in my life.

      • masquenox@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Most of my coworkers can barely make it through their own tasks

        I guess you haven’t met many CEOs, then.

      • AcidMarxist [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        if you dont raise your children to be adults, they won’t act like adults when they grow up. A revolution would mean people learning entirely new skills, like making decisions in the workplace. Most workers have no agency, theyre treated like machines, so I dont expect people raised in that society to know how to run a completely different one from scratch. Revolution is a process, it has to be built. Keep shitting on your coworkers tho, im sure its a productive activity

        • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          They can’t even learn to do the tasks they are expected to do now. Even with frequent coaching. How the fuck can you expect them to learn to make business decisions?

            • CriticalResist8 [he/him]@hexbear.net
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              edit-2
              1 year ago

              I used to work for a food type company and the way they decided to import and sell stuff locally was if the board of directors (the CEO who inherited the company from daddy + his siblings) liked the item. They hired someone, my coworker, to actually run the market tests and everything and then promptly ignored any suggestion she had to make about the viability of this product on the local market, instead relegating her to a busser that was in charge of ordering the samples they decided they wanted.

              I remember one item nobody liked (they would give us the remaining samples in the break room like some dogs getting the leftovers), but one of the siblings liked it and they got that close to putting it on the market because of it.

        • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          Highly depends on your coworkers. My current coworkers? Yeah they’re great, we have two electrical engineers on my team, buncha geniuses.

          My last job? Oh man I wouldn’t trust those guys as far as I could throw em.

      • Infynis@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Most of my coworkers can barely make it through their own tasks without fucking something up

        This is a problem with the company you work for, not your coworkers. I’m sure if they were paid more, were given more agency, and received better training, they’d be better elployees

        • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          Either that or the reason they purposefully hire meth-addled freaks is because they want desperate people who won’t fight for any of those things.

          Source: Friend who works in a warehouse and has coworkers who are obviously there to get a paycheck to afford their fix and then move on. It’s the company culture. They could choose to hire better people, or mentor the people who could grow, they don’t.

        • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          No, they’re just idiots. Myself and others have had the same training and responsibilities and do fine. It’s not that difficult of a job.

    • dartos@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      Yeah but capitalism also made reddit great, before making it terrible.

      There’s a balance in there somewhere. What we got ain’t it tho.

      • ProxyTheAwesome [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        ·
        1 year ago

        Reddit was never great lmaoo

        It was a pedo networking tool reknowned worldwide for it’s jailbate and non-consensual creepshots. These moderators received awards from admins. Then it got too much attention and got a PR workover, burning a woman CEO at the stake to satiate the gamer-fascists before becoming a bland Atlanticist CIA sockpuppet front of bland corporate posts.

        At no point during this entire thing did it ever approach anything comparable to greatness

      • Bobby_DROP_TABLES [he/him]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        There is no balance though, the shit-ification that happened to Reddit is a necessary function of capitalism. What we saw as Reddit at its best was, from a capitalist’s perspective, Reddit at its worst. I’m sure you’ve noticed a similar process taking place in lots of other areas as well.

        • quarrk [he/him]@hexbear.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          What we saw as Reddit at its best was, from a capitalist’s perspective, Reddit at its worst.

          And capitalists will allow this “at its worst” phase in order to capture the market, before squeezing it. This pattern is consistent in many industries.

        • dartos@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          I may be wrong, but I don’t see socialism and capitalism as hard opposites.

          I see capitalism and communism are like hard opposites with socialism somewhere in between.

          • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            Capitalism is the state controlled by the capital owners with the workers repressed.

            Socialism is the state controlled by the workers with the capital owners repressed.

            They are literally hard opposites. One is a bourgeoise-state and the other is a proletarian-state.

            • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 year ago

              Capitalism is where everything is owned by an individual

              Socialism is where only the means of production are owned by the state, but the individual still has private properties

              Communism is where everything is owned by the state

            • dartos@reddthat.com
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 year ago

              I learned that “capitalism” is an economic system, not a system of government.

              So you could have a socialist state that funds essentials like healthcare and transportation through taxes with a market (capitalist) economy.

              • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                That’s not a socialist state. It’s a capitalist state with welfare. If the political structure of the state itself has not been reworked to put the workers in power what you’re describing is just a state where the bourgeoisie (who control power) have decided to do welfare, usually for their own benefit such as reducing revolutionary energy by providing the workers with concessions (the welfare state). That is social democracy.

                You do not have socialism without overthrowing the hierarchy that places the bourgeoisie as the ruling class:

                Capitalism = Capitalists in power. Proles repressed.

                Socialism = Proletariat in power. Capitalists repressed.

                Communism = No more classes, only 1 class because the bourgeoisie have been completely phased out.

              • Ho_Chi_Chungus [she/her]@hexbear.net
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                1 year ago

                I learned that “capitalism” is an economic system, not a system of government.

                Consider for 3 seconds that what you “learned” about the world is a product of the system that produced it

                Capitalism is a system of government, and in capitalist countries, they teach their citizens that capitalism is at at odds with the state and not working in conjunction with it

              • drlecompte@discuss.tchncs.de
                link
                fedilink
                arrow-up
                0
                ·
                1 year ago

                Amazed that I had to scroll down this far to read this. Capitalism does not magically create a fair society through the creation of value (which seems to be what its proponents keep saying: investors generating economic activity and wealth). But similarly you could have a socialist economic system, with no real democracy. Which, as we’ve seen, devolves into a corrupt oligarchy. We’ve seemingly lost this perspective in the decades since WWII, but a solid representative parliamentary democracy and separation of powers are the best way to create and maintain a fair society. It requires some other conditions too, like good education, free press, etc. but the core is a system where power is distributed and temporary, depending on democratic processes (elections). This democratic legitimacy is what we should be defending at all costs, imho. It’s not sexy, though.

          • ThereRisesARedStar [she/her, they/them]@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            Okay, well, I’ve studied everything from all sorts of marxist tendencies to syndicalism to anarchism, to classical economics, and I think you’re either using terms wrong or have the wrong idea. Can you define your terms or rephrase what you mean?

            I apologize if this is too blunt.

            • dartos@reddthat.com
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 year ago

              So I understand total capitalism as an entirely market driven economy with no government influence

              And total communism as an entirely planned and government prescribed economy

              And socialism as some of the economy is market driven and some government planned.

              • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                0
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                Viewing it entirely in economics is incorrect. All of the above can be done under capitalism. The key difference is not what form of economics are employed but which class controls power and puts the resources of the state to use.

                The capitalist state is a state where capital owners hold power and use that power to exploit more capital.

                The socialist state is a transitionary state in which the workers have seized power and use the state to repress the bourgeoisie and put resources to their own use.

                The communist state is what occurs when capitalism is entirely defeated, all nations are socialist, conflict is eliminated and material abundance is achieved, at which point states start to stop existing as the resources within them that are put towards repressing the bourgeoisie through violence are put towards other things when there is only 1 class in society.

      • space_comrade [he/him]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        Yes because people never communicated over the Internet before Glorious Visionary Entrepreneurs from the Great Private Sector took hold of it and gave us all these Valuable Products, they just sat on their ass wondering what to do with such technology like complete idiots.

        I swear free market ideology is the dumbest shit you can possibly believe in, I’d sooner become a fucking Mormon.

        • Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          How would you have communicated without someone owning a server and paying for it? Reddit and other centralized platforms emerged for some reason… You would have to literally make that illegal, i.e. make it illegal to host your own server and let users use it.

          You can’t just imagine some fantasy utopia, and compare that to the current system.

          • space_comrade [he/him]@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            How would you have communicated without someone owning a server and paying for it?

            You do realize the Internet first started being used by universities and the military, not the private sector, right? I see literally no reason why Internet infrastructure couldn’t be publicly owned. It could function pretty much like any other public utility.

            • Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              0
              ·
              1 year ago

              And would it have grown into more than that? Into something that everyone, and not just military and scientists can use?

              • space_comrade [he/him]@hexbear.net
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                edit-2
                1 year ago

                Why not?

                Sorry I just don’t buy into the ideology that the free market has this kind of “magic sauce” that makes everything innovative and better.

                The early Internet was filled of people doing all kinds of cool things for free just because it was interesting to do, the only thing the private sector did is provide the base infrastructure, this is something the state can easily do too. All kinds of communities, FOSS software and media popped up and none of them had VC funding or expected any money out of it.

                It was only in mid-late 2000 that capital really sank its teeth into the Internet properly.

    • Kidplayer_666@lemm.eeOP
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      I left Reddit because of short term decisions to squeeze money out of consumers to look good in an IPO, instead of having an actual long term thought.

      • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        You left reddit because of capitalism. What is an IPO? It is the launch of a business onto the public capital markets to release equity and to enrich its existing owners. What do all businesses on the markets operate on? Short term growth for the next financial quarter optimised to enrich their investors (shareholders) in the shortest amount of time possible.

        Capitalism consistently destroys everything you enjoy and yet you defend it relentlessly while asking for long term thinking, which is not a feature of capitalism. When you wake up to this reality you might actually start to question “maybe the socialists are right about a few things” and spend some time with us learning what we actually believe.

        • Kidplayer_666@lemm.eeOP
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          But you know what happened after Reddit turned to crap? Because no one actually has to use Reddit, because Reddit is just a bunch of bored nerds and Reddit is just a bunch of forums, eventually someone realised: “wait a minute, I can code this in a few weeks and make it way less crappy than most social media. And maybe if I make it all open, a whole ecosystem of social networks can grow together”. And when Reddit turned to crap, “the invisible hand” acted and people slowly started to migrate over to lemmy and other social media and now reddit is just a bunch of bots

          • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            A few weeks?

            Mate please check my profile. I have been here for 3 fucking years. Lemmy did not magically appear in a few weeks that is incredibly offensive to the sheer amount of work my comrades have put in to make it.

            And calling their work “the invisible hand of the market” is also nonsensical. Because the forces driving its creation, and the rest of us communists that support it, are the destruction of the markets. There is not one single jot of profit motive involved in Lemmy. You seem to recognise some of the problems of capitalism but consistently come to incorrect conclusions about everything because you have spent no time whatsoever getting a real political education and understanding the forces at work.

            And you fail to ask yourself what happens to your “market forces” alternative to reddit. In any scenario where the market is responsible for replacing reddit the market will also bring it back to exactly the same point of self-destruction through pursuit of capital. You will hurt yourself all over again.

    • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      All types of governance and economic systems are susceptible to despotism.

      It takes a constantly educated and involved population to fight it.

      • BleatingZombie@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        Serious question. Is it possible to do this with very large populations? It seems like it might get inherently more complicated with several tiers of government (federal, state, county, city, etc…)

        • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          It definitely feels like Dunbar’s Number is a gate to keep this from being effective in large communities.

          If we can’t view more than a finite amount of other humans as being “real,” how do we begin to get massively large groups of humans to care for one another? This is a question I don’t have the answer to.

          • Deceptichum@kbin.social
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 year ago

            Because you don’t have to view them as “real” to know that caring for others can make things better for you too.

            I don’t think the issue is the being able to care, the issue is the arseholes turning groups against each other for their own gain.

            • Cryophilia@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              “I only do the right thing because God will punish me if I don’t” vibes lol.

              Why can’t you just operate from a principle of making things better for everyone?

    • GreenMario@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      “Military Intelligence”

      Two words combined that can’t make sense 🎵

  • RangerJosie@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    2
    ·
    20 days ago

    It can. In theory.

    The theoretical part is the “uncorrupt government” you speak of.

    The only way to keep a govt “uncorrupt” as you put it is under pain of literal death. And even then its not foolproof. Some will still be tempted.

    If you want a govt that will serve the people while being as incorruptible as possible you have to choose politicians by lottery instead of election. They get called, go serve, then go back to the life they had before. Like 4 years of Jury Duty. Political graspers, climbers, those will always trend towards corruption. Like that old addage, anyone actively seeking political office is unfit to serve in that capacity as their motivations are suspect. Power, authority, etc. All that is only intensified in a system as inconceivably corrupt and broken as ours is.

  • bitsplease@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    Most would agree with your point - right up until you suggest that having an “uncorrupt government” is remotely possible.

    Pretty much the same level of unrealistic idealism as folks who think it’s remotely possible to transition a state to communism without it turning into authoritarianism.

    There, now I’ve pissed off everyone lol

    Edit: Except, I guess for the hardcore capitalists, but I assume those guys are all too dumb to read, so no point, really 🤷

    • BearGun@ttrpg.network
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      Luckily an entirely uncorrupt government is not necessary, since that is indeed quite unlikely to ever happen. It is enough to have low corruption, which is much more achievable.

      • Treemaster099@pawb.social
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Honestly at this point, even a low corruption government seems harder than balancing a boulder on a toothpick for the super powers of the world

        • ???@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          Maybe so, but… That might be because China and America have too much international power. Power attracts the corrupt and global power attracts the most corrupt on the globe.

          • noobdoomguy8658@feddit.de
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            There’s a book about why power seems to attract this sort of people - can’t remember the name right now, might update later.

            In short, it’s not power on its own, but rather the systems we built around and for power, making it unattractive for people we want to end up in power, while the people who we don’t want to end up in power pursue it regardless because they want power for the sake of it.

            What I’m trying to say is, this is another issue that we can actually tackle and solve to a large degree. There’s hope!

    • NaibofTabr@infosec.pub
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Hexbear also has a large number of Putin and CCP apologists. Authoritarian bootlicking isn’t liberalism.

        • NaibofTabr@infosec.pub
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          Pushing Native Americans onto reservations lifted a lot of European immigrants out of poverty.

          Burning fossil fuels lifted entire nations out of poverty.

          Campaigns against the barbarians lifted many Romans out of poverty.

          If you think this “lift” is some example of public good in action that hasn’t come at the cost of exploitation, you’re delusional.

          • RedDawn [he/him]@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            Chinese poverty elimination didn’t come on the backs of any of those things you goober. “Well have you considered that sometimes OTHER countries did bad things to reduce domestic poverty, and therefore China doing so is inherently bad actually !?” Grow the fuck up, this isn’t a real argument.

          • Krause [he/him]@lemmygrad.ml
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            China lifted 800 million people out of poverty by building healthcare, transport, housing, jobs, education and food security? Heh, but what about that time European settlers got richer by genociding Native Americans? Technically that was “poverty reduction” too, commie smuglord

    • Wanderer@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      Well that’s just bullshit. Markets have brought more people out of poverty than anything.

        • KurtVonnegut [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          1 year ago

          Lib - “Markets make everything cheaper, which is good.”

          Leftist - “But if there is a labor market, won’t that make labor cheaper?”

          Lib - “Yes, and that is good.”

          Leftist - “How is that good?”

          Lib - “It leads to more profits.”

          Leftist - “But why is it good to have more profits?”

          Lib - “Because a good country is when corporations make profits, and the more profits the corporations make, the gooder the country is.”

          • Egon [they/them]@hexbear.net
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            Love to spend insane amounts of resources on creating a phone that has the same tech and capabilities as all the other phones, but I can’t just get access to their research and they can’t just get access to mine.
            Love to spend insane amount of time working up a cure to covid, but I can’t share my research with others and they can’t share it with me, yay this is awesome.
            Love to spend insane amount of resources working out how to make people want to buy a sugary drink and then spend even more to make them want to buy my drink specifically.
            Love to build empty houses and love to create 1.21 times more food than we need.
            Love to do all this as the world is burning and people are starving.
            Capitalism is the most efficient distribution of resources

          • wewbull@feddit.uk
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            ·
            1 year ago

            Kid: “Mommy, what’s a strawman?”

            Mother: “Take a look a this post here. See how they speak for both sides of the argument?”

            Kid: “Yes, they’re arguing with themselves.”

            Mother: “Exactly, and they can make their opponent say what they want.”

            Kid: “That seems like an easy way to make your argument look good”

            Mother: "Yes. It’s like fighting someone who can’t put up any resistance. They could be made of straw. A strawman. "

            Kid: “Oh, I see.”

            • Egon [they/them]@hexbear.net
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              edit-2
              1 year ago

              You didn’t engage with their argument, but good try nonetheless. It’s nice to see you cling to a fallacy rather than engage in good-faith discussion of an argument clearly illustrated for you to relate to.

      • invalidusernamelol [he/him]@hexbear.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        Primitive accumulation is a bad term. It works if you’ve read the theory behind it, but otherwise it sounds like someone saving up a bunch of money then starting a successful business compared to what it is which was colonial genocide, enclosure of the commons, and mass starvation as people were ripped from agricultural labor and cast into the factories and mines to work for feudal lords turned industrial capitalists.

  • Astroturfed@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    The amount of left wing folks on some of the more extreme instances bashing the most left wing people in the American Democratic party because they’re not complete socialist idiologes is just wild. Like I want to see a major shift towards some form of democratic socialism in America and think we definitely need real change in that direction, but the hatred for elected officials closest to your views just because they aren’t extreme enough for you is silly.

    I don’t understand why they feel the need to attack the left win branch of the DNC when Joe Manchin equists. When the Republican party exists. Focus efforts on some positive change and getting people you want in office instead of trying to tear down what should be an ally. Make the people you think aren’t extreme left enough the conservatives of a new wave. The defeatest attitude that just criticizes the closest thing they have to what they want is just silly.

    Other than a violent change of the guard/revolution. It’s not going to be an instant process. You have to accept small progress where you can get it.

  • Dubious_Fart@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    I think you will find any place thats well moderated and cracks down on bigotry and hatespeech will skew left.

    Weird how that is, huh?

  • UnfortunateShort@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    I know a lot of you are meming, but the amount of dogshit takes here is almost depressing.

    There is no single answer to what a good government looks like, there is no “best one” and surely any single one that is based purely on ideals or idealized human behavior will fail, no matter how hard you believe in it.

    One of the arguably most successful governments is the Chinese one and they are and were neither just, nor friendly, nor purely capitalist, communist or authoritarian. They are very China first and fuck everyone else and that works because of a lack of conscience and them adapting to everything without a second thought. Looking away and screwing people over as needed. You can be capitalist as long as it works for them. You can do whatever if it benefits them.

    The US does this too, in different ways with similar effects.

  • beef_curds [she/her]@hexbear.net
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    You’ll be happy to know there’s a social media site just like lemmy run by capitalists. It has all the benefits that capitalist ownership provides.

  • OneNot@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    I wish it was just “towards the left”.

    I’m very much on the left socially and left of center economically, but even I feel like every other comments section on here reads like some insane tankie commune.

    • droans@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      It’s always a weird flavor, too. Like “I’m communist but only if I get all the wealth. Also I hate minorities but love the LGBT.”

      For some reason it just makes me think of Dennis on 30 Rock. “Fiscally liberal, socially conservative.”

      • Faresh@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        I’m communist but only if I get all the wealth. Also I hate minorities but love the LGBT

        Where did you see that?

        • droans@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          It’s a bit of hyperbole, but Lemmygrad and Hexbear aren’t far off.

          A lot of their users believe that Russia is a communist state, not some crony capitalist society that would make Bezos blush. They also seem to really love Trump for some reason.

  • Filthmontane@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    1 year ago

    Capitalism is not “when you have markets.” I totally agree that it’s important to have well regulated markets. But capitalism perverts democracy with bribery and lobbying. Democratic Socialism is when you have a democratic government and a democratic economy.

    • masquenox@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      There’s only one kind of democratic economy and we already have a word for it - it’s socialism. If the means of production isn’t owned by the workers it’s not democratic. It’s not socialist.

  • Wirlocke@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    Honestly, I think capitalism wouldn’t be so bad if it was limited to what it’s good at. Fashion, tech, entertainment, snacks, ect.

    But essential food, housing, water, healthcare, even electricity and internet access, the idea that these things that will always have infinite demand is haphazardly controlled through profit motive is disgusting.

    Infrastructures should be government controlled and free. Essential resources should have some sort of universal basic “food stamps” system. Then actual money just becomes the luxury “fun bucks” that you don’t lose out on if you don’t have a lot. For example pet owners would be given a credits for pet food and free vet care, but a silly pet costume would use money.

    Disclaimer: This is just a personal idea I’ve been mulling over, I’m sure there’s a million holes in it.

    • I think capitalism wouldn’t be so bad if it was limited to what it’s good at. Fashion, tech, entertainment, snacks, ect.

      The thing is that capitalism isn’t “good” at anything; all value is produced by workers. Fast fashion is an environmental nightmare, development of tech is in the interest of capital (automation shouldn’t be a threat to workers), most entertainment is constrained by the diktats of massive corporations, the vast majority of snacks are either unhealthy or extremely overpriced, and workers (particularly in the Global South) are being abused in all four cases

      • couragethebravedog@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        1 year ago

        Capitalism is definitely good at some things. Specifically generating wealth. If you’re a developing country you want to use capitalism because it will grow your economy as fast as possible. I think once a county has built enough wealth, they should switch to a blended system.

    • Dentzy@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      I mostly agree; personally I see it more as a minimums covered than specific sectors, so, capitalism is acceptable -and might be a better environment for personal growth than most- as long as everyone has the basics covered, so a roof over their head, basic food, basic clothing, minimal energy to cover AC/Heating and other minimal usage (that would need to be set by specialists, but you get the idea, X KW/h free per person/month), good public transportation, full healthcare and communication access. And then, depending on your situation you can improve over it, by paying the extras, like, example, I think everyone should have access to a 5Mb Internet access for free (Maybe a 5Gb data cap to prevent abuse, but, after the 5GB it slows down, so, you never actually lose the access). That is good for basic browsing, messaging and Social Media applications, with that, people are never locked out of the online world, allowing for job hunting, for appointment taking and other similar necessities, communication with friends and family, but also, public organisms and private companies. This access is either managed by the government via Public Companies, or mandated to Private Companies as a necessary requirement to be allowed to work in the Country (like, you need to have a $0 plan available or you are not granted the bandwidth usage). Then, if you are interested, you can buy higher packages, those would be “controlled” by the Private Companies in a “capitalistic” way.

      Why I like this approach? I think that the current “deification” of work is wrong -pushed actually by wealthy capitalists-, people should be allowed to simply exist, even if they do not work (they can be lazy, yes -and I do not see anything wrong with it-, but also, they can be deeply depressed, heavily disabled -or taking care of someone that is- or simply focusing on art, sports or other activities that not necessarily grant income), my approach would allow for it, but then you can also work if you want/can -for as long as you want/can- to have more (bigger house, better Internet access, designer clothes). I am privileged, I worked hard to get where I am, but I am in a good position, I would not stop working if only my basics would be covered, for me, the work I get paid for is an acceptable trade off for getting a bit more, but even then, I would be way more relaxed and enjoying life, if I knew that losing my job would mean losing my “small luxuries” but not condemning myself to poverty.

      That’s why I don’t fully agree with your division by sectors, because some can be very clear -snacks-, but others are more complicated -like tech, having the latest smartphone very year is a luxury, having a simple working smartphone is a necessity in today’s world-, or it can even vary -Like Internet was a luxury 20 years ago, but it is a necessity today-.

      I hope you get the idea, sorry for the wall of text.