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Kragura wrote:

Waagh!Balzsmasha! wrote:I like being free. I like the fact that if the guy next door is too good to work a menial job starting out in life ( oh im not doing this or that) he better actually be too good /qualified which in turn requires some work/smarts. If he doesnt wanna do anything then he finds himself screwed later. I like the fact that if I'm good at something I dont have to do it because im forced to do it. Whether I hate it or because I just dont like you. My hands are mine. I can get up and go when I want to where I want.
Problem is our country has been so loaded with social programs for so long that most young people really cant contrast . I dont owe anybody anything and nobody owes me anything just because I exist. You want utopia get a job save your money and that still wont gaurantee the wife , the kids and hapiness BUT your free to find WHAT makes YOU happy. I really cant understand what about communism is attractive to some people. It doesnt work; it merely exists.

If capitalism was a fair system then yes I think this could be true. however nowhere is capitalism fair, to become qualified he needs higher education to get higher education he needs money and what if his parent and friends aren't wealthy, then what? where does he make the money to make more money. he doesn't, he gets stuck in a poverty cycle that he has almost no chance of ever breaking out of, he ends up having more kids and sending them away to do cheap labour just so the family can be fed. he resorts to theft and violence to get what he needs however it's against the law for him to steal what now?. he does nothing he become another statistic to be glassed over by the people who scream capitalism has triumphed while ignoring the fact that 1.7 billion people live in absolute poverty.

capitalism is great in theory but has never worked in practice.

See, you're equating 'capitalism' with 'anarcho-capitalism'. This is a problem. A purely capitalist country doesn't exist at the moment, which is why I was talking about a balanced system being my ideal earlier.

I am in the process of becoming qualified. I am not wealthy. My family isn't wealthy, in fact growing up we were the poorest of the poor. Remember that kid at your school who's mum cut their hair and who had crappy 'no-name' trainers? That was me. Even so, I live in a country in which a person like me can get a good education, has access to good health care, but also has pretty much zero in terms of a ceiling for what they can acheive with a bit of hard work. I have choice. REAL choice.

Frazzled wrote:Who said communism was fair? Who said life was fair?

If you don't think life is fair you should be striving to make it fair.


Albatross the fact you can go to a school means either that you were not one of the people I was talking about or the only reason you could go to school was because of a socialist ideal. also I understand the idea of anarcho capitalism, and your right no purely capitalist country exists on earth atm.



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Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:

Kragura wrote:

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:Guess I'll try to slip in here before this gets locked due to OT bickering. Communism, while in THEORY desirable, will never work with human society. Someone needs to be the one signing checks and driving the Ferrari, and someone needs to be asking if you want fries with that. It's how our society functions, the poor actually fill an important role, as seen in fight club (can't find a forum-appropriate clip )

EDIT: removed clip, inappropriate

Right lets try and pull this back on course.

This is very much what communism argues, that the poor play the most important part in society and should be rewarded as such.
(p.s seen fight club and loved it )

But if they are rewarded and made equal, then there is no more lower class, thus no one to keep the gears of society oiled. Communism wants everyone to be equal, and human society hasn't allowed that since we lived in caves as hunter-gatherers.

Why would giving the people who create all the wealth in society some of that wealth back, stop them from creating wealth.

Kragura wrote:Albatross the fact you can go to a school means either that you were not one of the people I was talking about or the only reason you could go to school was because of a socialist ideal.

While I can't really speak on the UK's education system, I know public education in the US was supported by Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, and our public education system eventually came to be modelled after that of Prussia (an extremely right-wing nation, by nearly any metric). It's quite a stretch to equate acceptance of public education with acceptance of the socialist ideology, that will just bring you to the "we can't build roads; Hitler built roads!" territory.

If you don't think life is fair you should be striving to make it fair.

As you say this, you should bear in mind that "fair" doesn't have a specific meaning or implementation.

The law of the jungle is perfectly fair. Everyone is thrown into the world with the same laws of physics, the same laws of nature, and off they go to try to make something of themselves. Is it "unfair" if a mouse gets nailed by a hawk? I wouldn't say so.

But people don't like the law of the jungle.

Ok, so what's fair? Is it fair when everyone gets provided with the same exact apartment, food, clothing, etc? Nobody goes without, everyone has the same things, nobody has any more than the next person?

I think that's more in line with your version of "fair," the communist notion of "fair." But I think it's pretty "unfair" that a worthless layabout of low moral character should see the same success in life as a dedicated, hard working individual.

At the end of the day, I'm not concerned with fairness. Not in your terms, not in mine. I'm concered with showing everyone due compassion, and from there letting the chips fall where they may.

"Fair" is too complicated and too subjective to bother with. We shouldn't spend our time on it. Instead we should be pramatically compassionate, and let God/Buddha/Fate/The Universe worry about fairness.

Everyone should have a roof over their head, food to eat, and some good but basic healthcare. Nothing fancy, just the bare minimum. Beyond that, people should be allowed to get what they can get.

That's not communism. Communism seeks to bring everyone to roughly the same level, to deny anybody much in the way of great property wealth. It's appealing when most people have nothing, but when most people are doing pretty well, as they are in the first world, it's not at all appealing.

Orkeosaurus wrote:

Kragura wrote:Albatross the fact you can go to a school means either that you were not one of the people I was talking about or the only reason you could go to school was because of a socialist ideal.

While I can't really speak on the UK's education system, I know public education in the US was supported by Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, and our public education system eventually came to be modelled after that of Prussia (an extremely right-wing nation, by nearly any metric). It's quite a stretch to equate acceptance of public education with acceptance of the socialist ideology, that will just bring you to the "we can't build roads; Hitler built roads!" territory.

no matter how basic and accepted the step is it is still a step towards socialism.


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Phryxis wrote:"Fair" is too complicated and too subjective to bother with. We shouldn't spend our time on it. Instead we should be pramatically compassionate, and let God/Buddha/Fate/The Universe worry about fairness.

So are morals, should we bother with those?




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Monster Rain wrote:Do the 1.7 billion poor people bear no responsibility for improving their situation?

Are you saying that they are poor because their lazy?


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Frazzled wrote:Its irrelevant. Its still a group trying to tell the majority what to do.

The same could be said for every governmental system except for anarchy and communism.

Kragura wrote:
The same could be said for every governmental system except for anarchy and communism.

Anarchy and communism are, by definition, not governmental systems.

The problem is that, anarchy being what it is, there is no unifying force to ensure that everyone will work to maintain an anarchic system. If such a force existed, then the system wouldn't be anarchic. Indeed, there are many theorists that argue that anarchy isn't sustainable given the social nature of the human animal.

Communism deals with this by positing that all people will be free from want, and will therefore no longer need to impose their will on others, intentionally or otherwise. The problem with that idea is twofold:

First, freedom from want pretty much entails the absence of scarcity, and that's not going to come about any time soon.

Second, there's a very real sense in which material desire is not the sole motivation for human interaction, exploitation, and oppression.


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Kragura wrote:
So are morals, should we bother with those?

Systemically?

I think there's a pretty good argument that morality has no significant place in any conversation about what constitutes the best possible system of government, or economic allocation.


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Kragura wrote:
If you don't think life is fair you should be striving to make it fair.

Only if you think fairness is good.

If I'm on top of the so-called pyramid, then why should I be interested in fairness if fairness has no bearing on my ability to remain at the top of the pyramid?

why shouldn't morals be considered when forming a government? I'm sorry but your entire post strikes me as cruel and callous. maybe I'm confused. are you saying we should only look out for our own interests?

Dogma
you said: I think there's a pretty good argument that morality has no significant place in any conversation about what constitutes the best possible system of government, or economic allocation.

the argument can be made.... but I think its inescapable that a government of bad men will necessarily enact bad policies, no matter what particular forms it follows. Therefore I, you, the community, the state - everyone - has a legitimate interest in seeing that people do not become bad - that they become and remain moral. For me to be at least reasonably certain that my neighbor is a moral, or at least a quasi-moral, person, is not an intrusion on liberty - its a gauruntee of it.

Although I'm pretty moderate on most things, in this one area I'm a reactionary conservative. Morality matters because the quality of human being in the community matters. It has direct political consequences for me and the people I care about - thats why I have a right to look into how other people live their lives, and to express approval or disapproval, not just through my opinion, but through the laws. If someone wants to opt out of the scrutiny, he should be allowed to - by opting out of the political process. By disenfranchising himself. Then, as long as he's not hurting me or anyone else, I could care less. But as long as he's voting, I care.

IMO whats really driving the whole "you cant legislate morality" idea is that theres no real consensus on what mroality is anymore. If we all agreed tomorrow what it was, we wouldnt be taking such a hands off approach. A couple generations back no one hesitated. Rightly or wrongly, they believed they had knowledge and werent afraid to act on it.
AF

So are morals, should we bother with those?

Yes and no. We should certainly "bother" with morals, and, honestly, we should all have an opinion on what it means for things to be fair and/or moral.

But we shouldn't build our system of government to enforce our opinions on these matters, at least not too dogmatically.

In the end, "fairness calculation" is really just a subset of "moral calculation." We all make our moral calculations on what is right, and what is wrong, and even to what degree things are right and wrong. We'd all agree, for example, that insulting somebody is not as bad as killing them, but both are in some degree immoral. I think we'd also probably agree that it should be legal to insult people, but not legal to kill them (obvious exceptions aside).

So, why shouldn't we legislate against insulting people? It's immoral, so why should it be tolerated?

The same goes for fairness. If you're not willing to legislate towards enforcing perfect morality, then why legislate towards enforcing perfect fairness? Certainly there's a debate here, what's "too immoral" to be tolerated? What's "too unfair." Clearly we accept that some things are "too" whatever, and we make laws to try to prevent/mitigate them.

But, as you can see, the idea that some immoralities, some unfairnesses, should go "uncorrected" is part and parcel of how all societies operate.

So, it's not about declining to think about morality... It's just about trying to limit enforcing your morality on people, and doing it only in situations in which the most immoral events occur.

Kragura wrote:why shouldn't morals be considered when forming a government? I'm sorry but your entire post strikes me as cruel and callous. maybe I'm confused. are you saying we should only look out for our own interests?

I'm not saying that we should do anything.

I'm asking you two questions:

1. Why is fairness good?

2. Are you arguing that morality should be significant to considerations of systematic value?


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AbaddonFidelis wrote:
the argument can be made.... but I think its inescapable that a government of bad men will necessarily enact bad policies, no matter what particular forms it follows. Therefore I, you, the community, the state - everyone - has a legitimate interest in seeing that people do not become bad - that they become and remain moral. For me to be at least reasonably certain that my neighbor is a moral, or at least a quasi-moral, person, is not an intrusion on liberty - its a gauruntee of it.

Sure, its a guarantee of liberty insofar as what is thought of as moral can be agreed to be a singular thing. I really don't think that's possible on a practical, or theoretical, level so to me any attempt to regulate morality on a systemic level works against liberty.

To me any given society should be designed to perpetuate itself, and that means being as minimally restrictive as possible. Things like the prohibition of murder, theft, etc. while based on the regulation of morality, are founded on the base consensus necessary for the establishment of social trust. This is distinct from determining the nature of an abstract ethical concept like fairness, or good.

I'm sorry dogma but I can't understand what your asking as I said I'm not to intelligent.

Well, the question on fairness is an off-shoot of Phyxis comment regarding the ambiguity of the term. Its sort of a thought exercise to get you to articulate what sort of fairness you mean, and why it would be a good thing.

For example, in the past I've argued that a 'good' definition of fairness is "The provision of reward in accordance with relevant criteria." I consider this to be a 'good' definition of fairness because it establishes a criterion for specific applications of the term without forcefully eliminating a lot of possible options.

The second question regards how the state should determine how to govern its populace. Is it a matter of morality, economic returns, sustainability, power, etc.?

I used to literally be a card carrying member of the communist party. I even lived in Russia for 6 months on a foreign exchange program........Now I think it's about the worst system that can be enacted. It's a beautiful idea in a Utopian society, but we don't live there. It also a beautiful idea with Utopians....but a large portion of humans are garbage.

I have now gone almost 180 and gone straight to regulated social libertarian. I believe regulated libertarianism is the way to go

While I loved the Idea of communism, I realized it is basically anathema to human nature. IMHO it's smarter to use a system the nurtures and embraces basic human nature of greed and competition. I think anything else is like spitting at the rain. Most communist governments have fallen to the exact ideology they denounce, greed.

Communism always sounds good, until you get a job, earn a "decent" human wage,and have bills and taxes to pay. It killed me when I was struggling and treading water with my job (paying student loans) and I saw my tax money going to baby momas and corner hustlers. I had a decent job and a old used car. They had no job, temp tags on the new explorer and flat panel TV's, buying better food then I did at the store and threw it on a government card....THAT"S MY MONEY!

I pretty much hate communism (and unfettered socialism) now. The real workers (middle class) get screwed by management (the rich) and bums (the poor).

dogma wrote:Well, the question on fairness is an off-shoot of Phyxis comment regarding the ambiguity of the term. Its sort of a thought exercise to get you to articulate what sort of fairness you mean, and why it would be a good thing.

For example, in the past I've argued that a 'good' definition of fairness is "The provision of reward in accordance with relevant criteria." I consider this to be a 'good' definition of fairness because it establishes a criterion for specific applications of the term without forcefully eliminating a lot of possible options.

The second question regards how the state should determine how to govern its populace. Is it a matter of morality, economic returns, sustainability, power, etc.?

1. I've never really thought about this before and will have to get back to you.

2.well in my opinion morality while it exists. nothing when it doesn't (obviously).

Dark Scipio wrote:In fact facists have nothing to do with conservatives.
Radical Conservatives are Reactionary. As Radical Socialist are Communists (Librals -> Anarchists).

Facist are Radicals Unhappy people not more not less. Mostly Facists are more closely allegiant to Socialists than to that of the two other ideologies (Like in Germany and Italy during WW2)

I agree that radical conservatives becomes reactionaries, not fascists. But it isn't true that fascism is more closely tied to socialism, that just makes no sense. Fascism rose up to oppose socialism. Franco's coup in socialist Spain didn't happen because the socialists and Franco's fascists had so much in common. The conservatives and the aristocrats allied with Hitler's Nazis against the socialists for clear reasons.

Fascism is not socialism, it was the direct response to socialism.


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Guitardian wrote:That vicious bastard from frazz's link was not caused by communism, he was caused by being a vicious bastard.

No. What happened there was the direct result of their ideology, and their commitment to that ideology above and beyond their interest in the welfare of their people.

You can look to Mao's Five Year Plans and the collectivisation in Soviet Russia to see the same thing - 'no seriously do this thing we're building a great new state it's going to be awesome wait what did you say how many people are dead?'


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Waagh!Balzsmasha! wrote:I like being free. I like the fact that if the guy next door is too good to work a menial job starting out in life ( oh im not doing this or that) he better actually be too good /qualified which in turn requires some work/smarts. If he doesnt wanna do anything then he finds himself screwed later. I like the fact that if I'm good at something I dont have to do it because im forced to do it.

Okay that's nice and all but it really, really has nothing to do with communism. Seriously, would people just accept that communism is not just a really extreme version of the welfare system? In many, if not all communist countries, people who weren't able to keep gainful employment were dealt with incredibly harshly.

No communist state has ever set about trying give everyone the same level of wealth, doctors are paid more than street sweepers. No communist state would ever tolerate the idea of welfare mums, the child is put in a creche and the mother keeps on working her job on the steel press.

The actual substance of communism is all to do with the state owning the means of production. The debate is over the flexibility and profit motive of capitalism to drive economic growth, against the stability and potential removal of externalities of a state based economic system. Understand this, then comment on the system.


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Frazzled wrote:Its irrelevant. Its still a group trying to tell the majority what to do.

And the two only start to look similar to one peculiar brand of American conservatives who view the entirety of politics as good wholesome freedom and government. To those of us not afflicted with that brain eating virus, the many actual differences between socialism and fascism actually matter.


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Phryxis wrote:That's not communism. Communism seeks to bring everyone to roughly the same level, to deny anybody much in the way of great property wealth. It's appealing when most people have nothing, but when most people are doing pretty well, as they are in the first world, it's not at all appealing.

No, as I explained in this thread earlier on, no communist nation ever tried to put everyone on the same level of income. Doctors got better houses and nicer cars* than street sweepers.

The real difference was that no-one was able to generate income from owning factories or the like. This flattened income distribution because there were no Bill Gates, no Rupert Murdochs. The problem isn't that no-one bothered to become doctors, there were plentiful doctors and they were perfectly capable. The problem was that medical science didn't improve, because they didn't have the business sector to develop new drugs and medical equipment.

So, again, the debate isn't about the individual working hard to get a higher paying job. You can still do that.




*Well, nice by the standards of communist countries. Whatever else may be true in history, we know no communist country ever produced a decent car.


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Andrew1975 wrote:I used to literally be a card carrying member of the communist party. I even lived in Russia for 6 months on a foreign exchange program........Now I think it's about the worst system that can be enacted. It's a beautiful idea in a Utopian society, but we don't live there. It also a beautiful idea with Utopians....but a large portion of humans are garbage.

I have now gone almost 180 and gone straight to regulated social libertarian. I believe regulated libertarianism is the way to go

I remember reading a dissection of the neo-cons back in the day, and they noted that a fair few of them had started out extreme left wing. They came to see the many failings of communism and swung 180 to become neocons, replacing their grand sweeping theories of the wonderousness of communal living with grand sweeping theories of the wonderousness of the freedom of rugged individualism.

The writer of the article pointed out that perhaps what these people had missed was that the real problem is with thinking any grand sweeping theory could possibly account the complexity of the modern world at all.

Great post Sebster but this needs addressing

The actual substance of communism is all to do with the state owning the means of production.

No it's not, no matter what countries branded communist by the west have done, communism is about making the means of production communily owned by everyone and abolishing wage slavery and private property.

Kragura wrote:No it's not, no matter what countries branded communist by the west have done, communism is about making the means of production communily owned by everyone and abolishing wage slavery and private property.

If you put it into the hands of the community, then you put it into the hands of the representatives of the community, and that means it's controlled by the state.

And there would still be private property. You could still own your own hat. I think you mean there would be no private ownership of the means of production.

Kragura wrote:
Albatross the fact you can go to a school means either that you were not one of the people I was talking about or the only reason you could go to school was because of a socialist ideal.

There have been grammar schools in England since the Tudor times.

Kragura wrote:Great post Sebster but this needs addressing

The actual substance of communism is all to do with the state owning the means of production.

No it's not, no matter what countries branded communist by the west have done, communism is about making the means of production communily owned by everyone and abolishing wage slavery and private property.

Thats the same. So you are saying, that there never was a communist nation. Thats partly true, because it doesnt work.

I think Christianity is the better path: It focuses not the political bodies and nations, but the Individual. In fact the outcome is much better. If everybody would be a real and good Christan (wich almost nobody is) it would be even better than if every nation would be communist (wich does not work/is impossible).

Kragura wrote:The same could be said for every governmental system except for anarchy and communism.

Are you intentionally playing ignorant here? Every communist system tried has been a bloodbath and failed utterly. Just because you choose to ignore doesn't mean it didn't occur.


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sebster wrote:And the two only start to look similar to one peculiar brand of American conservatives who view the entirety of politics as good wholesome freedom and government. To those of us not afflicted with that brain eating virus, the many actual differences between socialism and fascism actually matter.

Real classy way to argue a point there Sebster. Whats stage II-do you just start throwing poo?


To the point. Taken to their logical conclusion both socialism and fascism are kissing cousins. At the end of the day they are still dictatorial governments telling the average person what to. Whether its what type of food they can or can't have, it doesn't matter if the guy telling you is wearing a brown shirt or a red shirt. he's still telling you what to do and using government power to make you do it.


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Kragura wrote:Great post Sebster but this needs addressing

The actual substance of communism is all to do with the state owning the means of production.

No it's not, no matter what countries branded communist by the west have done, communism is about making the means of production communily owned by everyone and abolishing wage slavery and private property.

What mythical state is this? The state owns the preprty. The "people" only have a small use of it. Wage slavery is abolished? So you haven't actually studied any communist states then. Everything is now clear.

Andrew1975 wrote:

I pretty much hate communism (and unfettered socialism) now. The real workers (middle class) get screwed by management (the rich) and bums (the poor).

feth the middle class. The REAL workers are the poor. The ones who don't sit in cushy offices and actually have to WORK while they are at work, and live from one paycheck to the next. Lucky you with your foreign exchange program in russia to decide that communism sucks. All of us mooching bums didn't get that opportunity. So sorry we are screwing over the middle class with our 40 hour a week slaving away at construction sites for gak wages so you can have a nice middle class office job. What you said was just plain insulting, whether you have been to russia or not doesn't change the fact that poor people try hard too. Who brings your lunch to your work? Who builds the office building the 'middle class' work in? Who takes away your garbage? Oh yeah, all of us 'bums' who are clearly just mooching off of society, and hoping they can make the rent from month to month.

I think he's talking about the noworking poor. I know many of them, but I've also known many moochers. Moochers bad, hardworking people good.

dogma wrote:

AbaddonFidelis wrote:
the argument can be made.... but I think its inescapable that a government of bad men will necessarily enact bad policies, no matter what particular forms it follows. Therefore I, you, the community, the state - everyone - has a legitimate interest in seeing that people do not become bad - that they become and remain moral. For me to be at least reasonably certain that my neighbor is a moral, or at least a quasi-moral, person, is not an intrusion on liberty - its a gauruntee of it.

Sure, its a guarantee of liberty insofar as what is thought of as moral can be agreed to be a singular thing. I really don't think that's possible on a practical, or theoretical, level so to me any attempt to regulate morality on a systemic level works against liberty.

To me any given society should be designed to perpetuate itself, and that means being as minimally restrictive as possible. Things like the prohibition of murder, theft, etc. while based on the regulation of morality, are founded on the base consensus necessary for the establishment of social trust. This is distinct from determining the nature of an abstract ethical concept like fairness, or good.

well I think that if you let people do whatever comes naturally they'll degenerate.... so over the long term a society that does this, that has too much freedom, wont perpetuate itself. it will implode. its not really practical right now bc theres no agreement on what morality is, which is really too bad....

Guitardian wrote:

Andrew1975 wrote:

I pretty much hate communism (and unfettered socialism) now. The real workers (middle class) get screwed by management (the rich) and bums (the poor).

feth the middle class. The REAL workers are the poor.

Who do you think pays for all of the social programs that the "real workers" enjoy so much?

word

Monster Rain wrote:

Guitardian wrote:

Andrew1975 wrote:

I pretty much hate communism (and unfettered socialism) now. The real workers (middle class) get screwed by management (the rich) and bums (the poor).

feth the middle class. The REAL workers are the poor.

Who do you think pays for all of the social programs that the "real workers" enjoy so much?

I don't enjoy any social programs, never have, never will. And yeah I have done some gak jobs for gak pay in my time. Maybe social programs for the welfare cases are a roundabout way of bribing the unprivelliged to not break into your house and just take your nice 'middle class' stuff.

Guitardian wrote:

Monster Rain wrote:

Guitardian wrote:

Andrew1975 wrote:

I pretty much hate communism (and unfettered socialism) now. The real workers (middle class) get screwed by management (the rich) and bums (the poor).

feth the middle class. The REAL workers are the poor.

Who do you think pays for all of the social programs that the "real workers" enjoy so much?

I don't enjoy any social programs, never have, never will. And yeah I have done some gak jobs for gak pay in my time. Maybe social programs for the welfare cases are a roundabout way of bribing the unprivelliged to not break into your house and just take your nice 'middle class' stuff.

They would anyway. Thats what the boobytrapped rocket propelled chainsaw is for.

Kragura wrote:

Monster Rain wrote:Do the 1.7 billion poor people bear no responsibility for improving their situation?

Are you saying that they are poor because their lazy?

Re-read my statement and you tell me if that's what I'm saying.

You're missing a key word, I think.

Guitardian wrote:

Monster Rain wrote:

Guitardian wrote:

Andrew1975 wrote:

I pretty much hate communism (and unfettered socialism) now. The real workers (middle class) get screwed by management (the rich) and bums (the poor).

feth the middle class. The REAL workers are the poor.

Who do you think pays for all of the social programs that the "real workers" enjoy so much?

I don't enjoy any social programs, never have, never will. And yeah I have done some gak jobs for gak pay in my time. Maybe social programs for the welfare cases are a roundabout way of bribing the unprivelliged to not break into your house and just take your nice 'middle class' stuff.

So if the people that "the man" are keeping down are unprivileged, that would mean that I, a contributing member of society am privileged? If I am, it's only because I've worked my ass to become so.

Well that's YOUR house Frazz... most folks just get a sticker on the window that says 'neighborhood watch'.