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United States42490 Posts
The whole point of the mushroom forager in the metaphor is that he doesn't get $0 or $100 or any amount of $, he gets mushrooms. He, and he alone, gets exactly what he earned because in an example that simple it is very clear what the fair distribution is. For everyone else in an interconnected society earning $ the exact amount of $ earned is basically arbitrary.
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On February 01 2025 09:55 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 09:50 Vivax wrote:On February 01 2025 09:45 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 09:44 Vivax wrote:
I think dollars and euros are both intertwined measurements of the unit of western labour in time, not necessarily usefulness.
Intertwined means non-negotiable in terms of value between each other. By decisions nade by others.
I think every decision maker in those rooms is aware that changing the balance equals to a break-up in relations.
Or that we have to work similarly in proportion to our size.
But Europe simply isn‘t big on size without immigration. Dollars are measures of dollars. A kilo is a kilo but it doesn‘t translate to units or your lifetime for a defined unit of labour unlike a currency. Sure they do. My kid gains kilos over time. Doesn’t gain dollars over time. I can’t measure him in dollars, nobody offers appraisals on children. A dollar is absolutely not a measure of lifetime or a defined unit of labour.
It is when you work a low wage job and are paid out in dollars that barely get you through the day. It‘s like watching your life expire in slow-motion while you drone away at a task.
When you earn a shitton it becomes more abstract and about allocation of your earnings and so on.
I agree with acrofales post.
Money nowadays is…weird because of said discrepances. It‘s still vital for living when you don’t have it but also can appear rather worthless because of how much some people have. Legal employment hardly makes you rich. Companies work for shareholders and not for the ones who generate value within them.
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On February 01 2025 16:50 JimmyJRaynor wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 16:31 Acrofales wrote:The basic premise of capitalism is that a day of labor is worth whatever people are willing to pay you for it. you should prolly tighten up what you mean by "basic premise". In any event, your statement is incorrect. This is the foundation of capitalism. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmcmauM78FE
We begin at the metaethical level. To evaluate any social systems one must first begin with identifying man's nature. Man's defining and essential characteristic is his rational faculty. Man's mind is his basic means of survival. Thought can only occur within an individual. There is no collective brain. Production is the application of reason to the problem of survival. This is the foundation.... things branch out exponentially from this point.
(1) Ayn Rand is not the foundation of capitalism. Laissez-faire existed as an idea since the 17th century, and was somewhat formally described by Adam Smith.
(2) I didn't write a treatise, nor post a 47-minute video. I wrote a short paragraph. The paragraph you wrote is meaningless blather that does not describe capitalism, at most it describes individualism, but even that is difficult to distinguish. The question isn't about who does the work, but about who gets the value from it.
That said, I also explicitly said capitalism was a considerably harder concept to grasp than socialism. I'd still suggest starting from primary sources like Smith rather than a not-an-economist like Rand if you have any interest in the topic. For starters, even your short paragraph contains some very iffy language: we may not have collective brains, but we definitely have collective knowledge. Newton famously stood on the shoulders of giants. Nobody can deny his contribution to ideas about how the world works, but simultaneously nobody can deny that his ideas would not have existed without a long line of thinkers such as Pythagoras, Archimedes, Ptolemy, al-Kwharizmi, Copernicus and Galileo. That same goes for modern thinkers. Not to mention that most modern science and invention is not an individual endeavour, but rather done in (sometimes very large) teams. If the "foundation of capitalism" starts off with such an obvious denial of reality, you should discard it and try again (once again, I suggest Smith).
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I did a second attempt. This time with the help of chatgpt. Imho it leans too heavily on Marx, but I can't blame an algorithm. It just regurgitates what the internet taught it, and apparently Marx is pretty influential 
In capitalism, capital refers to the assets—like money, machinery, or property—that are invested to produce goods or services. The value created through labor and capital is distributed unevenly, with capital owners typically receiving a larger share of the profits, as they control the means of production. Workers, on the other hand, receive wages for their labor, which are often less than the value they help generate, leading to wealth accumulation concentrated among those who own capital.
I asked it to "write a short paragraph describing capitalism, using the words capital, value, labor and to include how value is attributed."
Those keywords seemed more pertinent to the discussion than blathering about metaethics and collective brains.
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The premise that only includes labor is myopic - it's not about a day's labor per se, the idea of a market economy is the "value" of everything is what people are willing to pay for it. What your chatbot missed is risk is also uneven - investing capital into a business that flops, fails, is outcompeted, can result in a loss or bankruptcy but you still have to pay the workers.
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yes won't someone please think of the poor venture capitalists...
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On February 01 2025 20:18 Gorsameth wrote:
yes won't someone please think of the poor venture capitalists...
When the AIbot says "often less" than the value they generate, it is tacitly affirming that there obviously must be cases when workers are paid more than the value they create. The reason that can happen, like if you have a branch of a franchise that nobody visits so you just sit at the register all day, if you're working publishing a print newspaper that's a loss leader, is that the person who manages the capital, who has demonstrated skill at managing capital by managing to a lot of it, has made those decision that support your existence even though you have a marginally negative impact by costing more than you produce. It is also why companies give raises, bonuses, promotions, and stock options. It's the reason there are labor laws that permit you to take your labor elsewhere depending on what someone else might pay for it, which the first admission was that labor does have value.
This is not unique to capitalism, in communist systems your labor also has a specific value it creates, and you get rewarded the same as everyone else. (Armchair people think this is fair because it's equal and different than the "real" values of labor, whereas in capitalism, it's unequal and different than the "real" values of labor. What most fail to realize is in capitalism people are as a group on average closer to the "real" values of labor. And the total value is almost always higher because capitalism funnels capital into prosperity.)
In authoritarian settings, you also lose the ability to market your labor and compete for other jobs and employment. And still get paid "unfairly" in the sense that your wage deviates from the "true" value, which doesn't exist because the only value is someone's willingness to pay for it, which is constantly changing as the market equilibrates between buyers and sellers.
The truth is there is no "unit" value of your labor, because nothing you do is isolated. Your labor is a marginal increase to an existing system. For example, a cashier can sit on a chair, or stand in front of a machine, punch buttons with numbers on them, maybe put things in a bag, calculate a total, and maybe handle some pieces of paper and metal or swipe a piece of plastic through a machine.
They can do that in two places:
1) A store
2) Their garage
The former is more likely to be profitable. The reason a person in situation 1 earns more than 2 is their labor has no value in isolation. It adds a certain marginal value to a company, which the company gives part or most of back, but not all of. The difference can be considered the value the company provides to the worker of having shoppers, marketing, products, etc. that didn't appear out of thin air but was built out of previously risked capital and man-hours of labor.
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On February 01 2025 20:46 oBlade wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 20:18 Gorsameth wrote:
yes won't someone please think of the poor venture capitalists... When the AIbot says "often less" than the value they generate, it is tacitly affirming that there obviously must be cases when workers are paid more than the value they create. The reason that can happen, like if you have a branch of a franchise that nobody visits so you just sit at the register all day, if you're working publishing a print newspaper that's a loss leader, is that the person who manages the capital, who has demonstrated skill at managing capital by managing to a lot of it, has made those decision that support your existence even though you have a marginally negative impact by costing more than you produce. It is also why companies give raises, bonuses, promotions, and stock options. It's the reason there are labor laws that permit you to take your labor elsewhere depending on what someone else might pay for it, which the first admission was that labor does have value. This is not unique to capitalism, in communist systems your labor also has a specific value it creates, and you get rewarded the same as everyone else. (Armchair people think this is fair because it's equal and different than the "real" values of labor, whereas in capitalism, it's unequal and different than the "real" values of labor. What most fail to realize is in capitalism people are as a group on average closer to the "real" values of labor. And the total value is almost always higher because capitalism funnels capital into prosperity.) In authoritarian settings, you also lose the ability to market your labor and compete for other jobs and employment. And still get paid "unfairly" in the sense that your wage deviates from the "true" value, which doesn't exist because the only value is someone's willingness to pay for it, which is constantly changing as the market equilibrates between buyers and sellers. The truth is there is no "unit" value of your labor, because nothing you do is isolated. Your labor is a marginal increase to an existing system. For example, a cashier can sit on a chair, or stand in front of a machine, punch buttons with numbers on them, maybe put things in a bag, calculate a total, and maybe handle some pieces of paper and metal or swipe a piece of plastic through a machine. They can do that in two places: 1) A store 2) Their garage The former is more likely to be profitable. The reason a person in situation 1 earns more than 2 is their labor has no value in isolation. It adds a certain marginal value to a company, which the company gives part or most of back, but not all of. The difference can be considered the value the company provides to the worker of having shoppers, marketing, products, etc. that didn't appear out of thin air but was built out of previously risked capital and man-hours of labor. a lot of words to say fuck all, and none of which has any relation to what your replying to.
I'm seriously starting to wonder if your just copying random BS from a chat bot
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On February 01 2025 20:50 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 20:46 oBlade wrote:On February 01 2025 20:18 Gorsameth wrote:
yes won't someone please think of the poor venture capitalists... When the AIbot says "often less" than the value they generate, it is tacitly affirming that there obviously must be cases when workers are paid more than the value they create. The reason that can happen, like if you have a branch of a franchise that nobody visits so you just sit at the register all day, if you're working publishing a print newspaper that's a loss leader, is that the person who manages the capital, who has demonstrated skill at managing capital by managing to a lot of it, has made those decision that support your existence even though you have a marginally negative impact by costing more than you produce. It is also why companies give raises, bonuses, promotions, and stock options. It's the reason there are labor laws that permit you to take your labor elsewhere depending on what someone else might pay for it, which the first admission was that labor does have value. This is not unique to capitalism, in communist systems your labor also has a specific value it creates, and you get rewarded the same as everyone else. (Armchair people think this is fair because it's equal and different than the "real" values of labor, whereas in capitalism, it's unequal and different than the "real" values of labor. What most fail to realize is in capitalism people are as a group on average closer to the "real" values of labor. And the total value is almost always higher because capitalism funnels capital into prosperity.) In authoritarian settings, you also lose the ability to market your labor and compete for other jobs and employment. And still get paid "unfairly" in the sense that your wage deviates from the "true" value, which doesn't exist because the only value is someone's willingness to pay for it, which is constantly changing as the market equilibrates between buyers and sellers. The truth is there is no "unit" value of your labor, because nothing you do is isolated. Your labor is a marginal increase to an existing system. For example, a cashier can sit on a chair, or stand in front of a machine, punch buttons with numbers on them, maybe put things in a bag, calculate a total, and maybe handle some pieces of paper and metal or swipe a piece of plastic through a machine. They can do that in two places: 1) A store 2) Their garage The former is more likely to be profitable. The reason a person in situation 1 earns more than 2 is their labor has no value in isolation. It adds a certain marginal value to a company, which the company gives part or most of back, but not all of. The difference can be considered the value the company provides to the worker of having shoppers, marketing, products, etc. that didn't appear out of thin air but was built out of previously risked capital and man-hours of labor. a lot of words to say fuck all, and none of which has any relation to what your replying to. I'm seriously starting to wonder if your just copying random BS from a chat bot
I was replying to someone who appeared to confuse the basic mechanics of a market with a suggestion that we need to play the world's smallest violin for high risk investors and organize our economies to protect them, which would be a meaningless strawman to nowhere. If that's only how it appeared, and there was an actual point made that I missed, then I apologize.
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The only thing I'm certain of is that money that completely stops flowing is money that has no value. The hundreds of millions and billions - basically trillions at this point - that are sitting in rich people's yachts and mansions and pools and bank accounts could go to people who have a real use for the money. It's being withheld and hoarded for decades at a time.
That money being actively spent was supposed to be the "trickle down effect". But it's not moving at all, the money is almost entirely frozen in place. Nothing is trickling. The superwealthy are turning people's money into unmoving icebergs. In this way they are destroying its value. It's as if they were lighting it on fire.
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+1 to Magic Powers remark.
I think Capitalism is dead and has been replaced with financial feudalism. It's damn near impossible for a normal person to get to be in the 1% within their lifetime.
Even if you happen to be 0.001% of top college athletes that get into a professional sports career, you'll make less in a lifetime than Elon paid to be a free agent on the government that you can neither fire or control.
Even all the "wunderkinds" of tech had a home supporting their ventures with free top notch education, networking and CASH.
Parents that were okay with their offspring ditching an ivy league university + gave them hundreds of thousands in cash to invest are ..rare.
And for every Elon/Zuckerborg/Gates, there are tens of thousand other rich fuckers that never made it and became some Nepobaby in their Parents Company only to be an "ordinary multi millionaire".
I am pretty tired on experts that suggest that "we the people" must work to make those mountains of cash ever larger, basicly offsetting the scale against normal people doing so.
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It's more profitable to own things than it is to make things. Fundamentally, to me, that's the issue.
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On February 01 2025 22:41 EnDeR_ wrote:
It's more profitable to own things than it is to make things. Fundamentally, to me, that's the issue.
You can do both. Making is harder, so just buy.
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On February 01 2025 22:47 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 22:41 EnDeR_ wrote:
It's more profitable to own things than it is to make things. Fundamentally, to me, that's the issue. You can do both. Making is harder, so just buy.
Kind of my point. Harder should give you bigger returns than simply doing nothing.
Case in point, I'd earn more profit from selling the house I bought 6 years ago than most people would make in 5 years. Which I find absolutely insane.
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Northern Ireland24945 Posts
On February 01 2025 04:57 maybenexttime wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 04:43 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 04:28 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 02:07 Sermokala wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Its extra funny considering he doesn't follow any of his advice. If anyone is petulantly shitposting its GH. Dude offers no solutions, no open hands to convince anyone of anything. He's never tried to convince anyone of anything other than cynically trying to opine why everyone else doesn't abandon their positions and admit he was right all along. On February 01 2025 02:02 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Alternatively, we could be adults capable of participating in a democracy? I'd really like us to be that *eyes glisten dramatically with optimism* On February 01 2025 01:55 Sadist wrote:On February 01 2025 01:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 00:54 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 00:51 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 00:20 Magic Powers wrote:
[quote]
Admittedly it's often not easy to ignore, but I can say that I carry a little bit less negative energy in myself through the day when I have the discipline to avoid pointless topics such as this one.
I've also stopped responding to certain individuals for many months (before I finally cave one time and then have to tell myself to never respond). It's funny because most posters can mostly ignore criticism/discussion from their left but we know they can't help themselves when it comes to stuff like spending pages shitposting about ATC dwarfs with oBlade. It's even worse right now since Democrats functionally have no leadership or message that Trump and his ilk are distracting the country from. So they literally end up asking for it. Ah yes, Sadist asking Oblade to defend the latest idiotic thing Trump said on teamliquid is why you're still 0 for 0 on revolutions. He should do better. Forget the revolutionary part, you guys need to be socialists ASAP or fascism is going to keep winning while your Democrat politicians collaborate with them. None of you libs/Dems have a real argument not to be socialists. It was so that you could beat Trump. That failed spectacularly. Nothing stopping you all from spending the next 6 months acting in good faith as socialists just to try it out. Well, nothing except your stubbornly undue hubris. Democrats have nothing else/better for you to be doing, and I promise bickering/shitposting with oBlade about dwarfs/genitals isn't more useful than developing a socialist worldview in community with your comrades. Can you clarify what you mean by becoming socialists? In the temporary sense and to be probably dangerously reductive, I basically mean approaching everything here with a sort of "how would a socialist I can relate to engage with this" and going from there. I mean look at this shit. He can't even answer what a socialist is without trying to put himself as the example people should be following. He doesn't understand that he lives in a democracy and that people can seriously engage with the one form of government that we have. I know communists and they're at least unafraid to tell people they don't belive in democracy and want authoritarianism. This guy is just scared to tell people how he thinks we should be doleing out power in this country. I agree with Zam on this. The question wasn't, as I understood it, "what is a socialist?" Though if Sadist or anyone else wants a hand finding a socialist they can relate to I'd be happy to assist their efforts. The US has something it calls "democracy", but there's more to democracy in any meaningful sense than ~30-70% of the country voting every couple years (if Trump/the fascists/Putin let you anymore). I'm advocating socialism. Socialism is democratic. I'm not "scared" to tell people we should live in a socialist, democratic country. It's easy to see the difference between how you describe my posts and what is actually in them for anyone reading both in good faith. To that point... I welcome anyone that wants to explore being a socialist while Democrats are busy appeasing Trump/fascists and bickering over ATC dwarfs and such, at least until it's time for them to tell you voting for evil (of the lesser kind) is your only hope (should Trump/the fascists allow it), to my Blog: Socialism Anyone?. The US has democracy. The problem with the US isn't Trump, the problem with the US is Americans. I don't think you have a plan to overcome that. Let's say that 20 years ago a democratic socialist America was the status quo. It would have been dismantled just as easily by conservative media and the breakdown of political norms. Your Americans would love Trump just as much as real Americans do. You spend so much time bashing America's choices and yet the best plan you can come up with is predicated on Americans somehow making better ones. Well, to be fair, isn't the whole socialist/communist utopia predicated on humans not being humans?
No, I’d argue it never really was either. We’re multifaceted creatures, and also rather malleable to cultural conditions.
There’s certainly challenges to transitioning to socialism, but most sensible thinkers I’ve read are rather aware of these.
Capitalism isn’t merely an economic system, it’s a colossus that bestrides everything and imprints a hell of a lot of cultural attachment as well. ‘You have nothing to lose but your chains!’ is less potent a rallying call if people have been conditioned to see those chains as a natural state of affairs, and be quite fond of em.
Things being so internationally interwoven and interconnected also rather complicates things for places who might want to give it a shot.
And of course we’ve examples of bad implementations and where that lead as well. Folks who deny that tend to be myopic lost causes, but in my experience they wouldn’t necessarily be the majority, most have grappled with those lessons and how to avoid those pitfalls in some future hypothetical socialism.
Broadly I find the charge of socialists being utopian hippies to be massively off the mark.
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On February 01 2025 22:59 EnDeR_ wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 22:47 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:On February 01 2025 22:41 EnDeR_ wrote:
It's more profitable to own things than it is to make things. Fundamentally, to me, that's the issue. You can do both. Making is harder, so just buy. Kind of my point. Harder should give you bigger returns than simply doing nothing. Case in point, I'd earn more profit from selling the house I bought 6 years ago than most people would make in 5 years. Which I find absolutely insane.
I should probably have kept typing, but nature calls and all of that. I was agreeing with you. If you can buy what you need/want and make money off of it eventually/immediately, that's the most logical choice. Given that you don't have other pressing matters that need your attention, of course. Making something and then selling it, whether that's an idea or something material, requires a lot of effort and as mentioned before, CASH. That part is what stops a lot of smart people from seeing a return on their time and investment. Even if you present the best idea, the risk that a lot of the wealthy people aren't willing to take on, ends up hurting the Maker. So the Maker just tries to find who'll buy and sell it cheaper than they wanted, or they abandon it altogether.
All of that to say; If you can buy it, do so and go about your life. If you are fortunate to have a network and resources, make it yourself and then sell when the value of it is where you deem it worthwhile.
I'm working on the latter because I wasn't born with the means to achieve the former.
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On February 01 2025 23:14 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 04:57 maybenexttime wrote:On February 01 2025 04:43 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 04:28 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 02:07 Sermokala wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Its extra funny considering he doesn't follow any of his advice. If anyone is petulantly shitposting its GH. Dude offers no solutions, no open hands to convince anyone of anything. He's never tried to convince anyone of anything other than cynically trying to opine why everyone else doesn't abandon their positions and admit he was right all along. On February 01 2025 02:02 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Alternatively, we could be adults capable of participating in a democracy? I'd really like us to be that *eyes glisten dramatically with optimism* On February 01 2025 01:55 Sadist wrote:On February 01 2025 01:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 00:54 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 00:51 GreenHorizons wrote:[quote] It's funny because most posters can mostly ignore criticism/discussion from their left but we know they can't help themselves when it comes to stuff like spending pages shitposting about ATC dwarfs with oBlade. It's even worse right now since Democrats functionally have no leadership or message that Trump and his ilk are distracting the country from. So they literally end up asking for it. Ah yes, Sadist asking Oblade to defend the latest idiotic thing Trump said on teamliquid is why you're still 0 for 0 on revolutions. He should do better. Forget the revolutionary part, you guys need to be socialists ASAP or fascism is going to keep winning while your Democrat politicians collaborate with them. None of you libs/Dems have a real argument not to be socialists. It was so that you could beat Trump. That failed spectacularly. Nothing stopping you all from spending the next 6 months acting in good faith as socialists just to try it out. Well, nothing except your stubbornly undue hubris. Democrats have nothing else/better for you to be doing, and I promise bickering/shitposting with oBlade about dwarfs/genitals isn't more useful than developing a socialist worldview in community with your comrades. Can you clarify what you mean by becoming socialists? In the temporary sense and to be probably dangerously reductive, I basically mean approaching everything here with a sort of "how would a socialist I can relate to engage with this" and going from there. I mean look at this shit. He can't even answer what a socialist is without trying to put himself as the example people should be following. He doesn't understand that he lives in a democracy and that people can seriously engage with the one form of government that we have. I know communists and they're at least unafraid to tell people they don't belive in democracy and want authoritarianism. This guy is just scared to tell people how he thinks we should be doleing out power in this country. I agree with Zam on this. The question wasn't, as I understood it, "what is a socialist?" Though if Sadist or anyone else wants a hand finding a socialist they can relate to I'd be happy to assist their efforts. The US has something it calls "democracy", but there's more to democracy in any meaningful sense than ~30-70% of the country voting every couple years (if Trump/the fascists/Putin let you anymore). I'm advocating socialism. Socialism is democratic. I'm not "scared" to tell people we should live in a socialist, democratic country. It's easy to see the difference between how you describe my posts and what is actually in them for anyone reading both in good faith. To that point... I welcome anyone that wants to explore being a socialist while Democrats are busy appeasing Trump/fascists and bickering over ATC dwarfs and such, at least until it's time for them to tell you voting for evil (of the lesser kind) is your only hope (should Trump/the fascists allow it), to my Blog: Socialism Anyone?. The US has democracy. The problem with the US isn't Trump, the problem with the US is Americans. I don't think you have a plan to overcome that. Let's say that 20 years ago a democratic socialist America was the status quo. It would have been dismantled just as easily by conservative media and the breakdown of political norms. Your Americans would love Trump just as much as real Americans do. You spend so much time bashing America's choices and yet the best plan you can come up with is predicated on Americans somehow making better ones. Well, to be fair, isn't the whole socialist/communist utopia predicated on humans not being humans? No, I’d argue it never really was either. We’re multifaceted creatures, and also rather malleable to cultural conditions. There’s certainly challenges to transitioning to socialism, but most sensible thinkers I’ve read are rather aware of these. Capitalism isn’t merely an economic system, it’s a colossus that bestrides everything and imprints a hell of a lot of cultural attachment as well. ‘You have nothing to lose but your chains!’ is less potent a rallying call if people have been conditioned to see those chains as a natural state of affairs, and be quite fond of em. Things being so internationally interwoven and interconnected also rather complicates things for places who might want to give it a shot. And of course we’ve examples of bad implementations and where that lead as well. Folks who deny that tend to be myopic lost causes, but in my experience they wouldn’t necessarily be the majority, most have grappled with those lessons and how to avoid those pitfalls in some future hypothetical socialism. Broadly I find the charge of socialists being utopian hippies to be massively off the mark.
I think the bigger issue a lot of people have, here at least, is that when pressed for a semblance of a plan or ideas on how to achieve it, they don't receive any details. Reading a book or going out and joining a group isn't really helpful. People join groups all of the time. But why would joining this particular group lead us to a socialist culture? What's the next step after? What's that look like from those who have been part of said group? These are needed to paint the picture for some, as you can attest, because not everyone has the time or energy to spend on going socialist club shopping.
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On February 01 2025 23:14 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 04:57 maybenexttime wrote:On February 01 2025 04:43 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 04:28 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 02:07 Sermokala wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Its extra funny considering he doesn't follow any of his advice. If anyone is petulantly shitposting its GH. Dude offers no solutions, no open hands to convince anyone of anything. He's never tried to convince anyone of anything other than cynically trying to opine why everyone else doesn't abandon their positions and admit he was right all along. On February 01 2025 02:02 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Alternatively, we could be adults capable of participating in a democracy? I'd really like us to be that *eyes glisten dramatically with optimism* On February 01 2025 01:55 Sadist wrote:On February 01 2025 01:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 00:54 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 00:51 GreenHorizons wrote:[quote] It's funny because most posters can mostly ignore criticism/discussion from their left but we know they can't help themselves when it comes to stuff like spending pages shitposting about ATC dwarfs with oBlade. It's even worse right now since Democrats functionally have no leadership or message that Trump and his ilk are distracting the country from. So they literally end up asking for it. Ah yes, Sadist asking Oblade to defend the latest idiotic thing Trump said on teamliquid is why you're still 0 for 0 on revolutions. He should do better. Forget the revolutionary part, you guys need to be socialists ASAP or fascism is going to keep winning while your Democrat politicians collaborate with them. None of you libs/Dems have a real argument not to be socialists. It was so that you could beat Trump. That failed spectacularly. Nothing stopping you all from spending the next 6 months acting in good faith as socialists just to try it out. Well, nothing except your stubbornly undue hubris. Democrats have nothing else/better for you to be doing, and I promise bickering/shitposting with oBlade about dwarfs/genitals isn't more useful than developing a socialist worldview in community with your comrades. Can you clarify what you mean by becoming socialists? In the temporary sense and to be probably dangerously reductive, I basically mean approaching everything here with a sort of "how would a socialist I can relate to engage with this" and going from there. I mean look at this shit. He can't even answer what a socialist is without trying to put himself as the example people should be following. He doesn't understand that he lives in a democracy and that people can seriously engage with the one form of government that we have. I know communists and they're at least unafraid to tell people they don't belive in democracy and want authoritarianism. This guy is just scared to tell people how he thinks we should be doleing out power in this country. I agree with Zam on this. The question wasn't, as I understood it, "what is a socialist?" Though if Sadist or anyone else wants a hand finding a socialist they can relate to I'd be happy to assist their efforts. The US has something it calls "democracy", but there's more to democracy in any meaningful sense than ~30-70% of the country voting every couple years (if Trump/the fascists/Putin let you anymore). I'm advocating socialism. Socialism is democratic. I'm not "scared" to tell people we should live in a socialist, democratic country. It's easy to see the difference between how you describe my posts and what is actually in them for anyone reading both in good faith. To that point... I welcome anyone that wants to explore being a socialist while Democrats are busy appeasing Trump/fascists and bickering over ATC dwarfs and such, at least until it's time for them to tell you voting for evil (of the lesser kind) is your only hope (should Trump/the fascists allow it), to my Blog: Socialism Anyone?. The US has democracy. The problem with the US isn't Trump, the problem with the US is Americans. I don't think you have a plan to overcome that. Let's say that 20 years ago a democratic socialist America was the status quo. It would have been dismantled just as easily by conservative media and the breakdown of political norms. Your Americans would love Trump just as much as real Americans do. You spend so much time bashing America's choices and yet the best plan you can come up with is predicated on Americans somehow making better ones. Well, to be fair, isn't the whole socialist/communist utopia predicated on humans not being humans? No, I’d argue it never really was either. We’re multifaceted creatures, and also rather malleable to cultural conditions. There’s certainly challenges to transitioning to socialism, but most sensible thinkers I’ve read are rather aware of these. Capitalism isn’t merely an economic system, it’s a colossus that bestrides everything and imprints a hell of a lot of cultural attachment as well. ‘You have nothing to lose but your chains!’ is less potent a rallying call if people have been conditioned to see those chains as a natural state of affairs, and be quite fond of em. Things being so internationally interwoven and interconnected also rather complicates things for places who might want to give it a shot. And of course we’ve examples of bad implementations and where that lead as well. Folks who deny that tend to be myopic lost causes, but in my experience they wouldn’t necessarily be the majority, most have grappled with those lessons and how to avoid those pitfalls in some future hypothetical socialism. Broadly I find the charge of socialists being utopian hippies to be massively off the mark.
The problem is that pretty much every single attempt at implementation on a larger scale ended up being an abject failure. Just look at the Eastern Bloc. Every single one of those countries purportedly tried to build this socialist utopia and remodel the man to fit this ideal. Every single one of those countries ended up building a kleptocratic dictatorship with a greedy elite and a cynical, nihilistic working class that tried to cheat the system in every way imaginable. Decades of brainwashing all in vain.
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Northern Ireland24945 Posts
On February 01 2025 23:20 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 23:14 WombaT wrote:On February 01 2025 04:57 maybenexttime wrote:On February 01 2025 04:43 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 04:28 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 02:07 Sermokala wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Its extra funny considering he doesn't follow any of his advice. If anyone is petulantly shitposting its GH. Dude offers no solutions, no open hands to convince anyone of anything. He's never tried to convince anyone of anything other than cynically trying to opine why everyone else doesn't abandon their positions and admit he was right all along. On February 01 2025 02:02 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Alternatively, we could be adults capable of participating in a democracy? I'd really like us to be that *eyes glisten dramatically with optimism* On February 01 2025 01:55 Sadist wrote:On February 01 2025 01:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 00:54 KwarK wrote:
[quote]
Ah yes, Sadist asking Oblade to defend the latest idiotic thing Trump said on teamliquid is why you're still 0 for 0 on revolutions. He should do better. Forget the revolutionary part, you guys need to be socialists ASAP or fascism is going to keep winning while your Democrat politicians collaborate with them. None of you libs/Dems have a real argument not to be socialists. It was so that you could beat Trump. That failed spectacularly. Nothing stopping you all from spending the next 6 months acting in good faith as socialists just to try it out. Well, nothing except your stubbornly undue hubris. Democrats have nothing else/better for you to be doing, and I promise bickering/shitposting with oBlade about dwarfs/genitals isn't more useful than developing a socialist worldview in community with your comrades. Can you clarify what you mean by becoming socialists? In the temporary sense and to be probably dangerously reductive, I basically mean approaching everything here with a sort of "how would a socialist I can relate to engage with this" and going from there. I mean look at this shit. He can't even answer what a socialist is without trying to put himself as the example people should be following. He doesn't understand that he lives in a democracy and that people can seriously engage with the one form of government that we have. I know communists and they're at least unafraid to tell people they don't belive in democracy and want authoritarianism. This guy is just scared to tell people how he thinks we should be doleing out power in this country. I agree with Zam on this. The question wasn't, as I understood it, "what is a socialist?" Though if Sadist or anyone else wants a hand finding a socialist they can relate to I'd be happy to assist their efforts. The US has something it calls "democracy", but there's more to democracy in any meaningful sense than ~30-70% of the country voting every couple years (if Trump/the fascists/Putin let you anymore). I'm advocating socialism. Socialism is democratic. I'm not "scared" to tell people we should live in a socialist, democratic country. It's easy to see the difference between how you describe my posts and what is actually in them for anyone reading both in good faith. To that point... I welcome anyone that wants to explore being a socialist while Democrats are busy appeasing Trump/fascists and bickering over ATC dwarfs and such, at least until it's time for them to tell you voting for evil (of the lesser kind) is your only hope (should Trump/the fascists allow it), to my Blog: Socialism Anyone?. The US has democracy. The problem with the US isn't Trump, the problem with the US is Americans. I don't think you have a plan to overcome that. Let's say that 20 years ago a democratic socialist America was the status quo. It would have been dismantled just as easily by conservative media and the breakdown of political norms. Your Americans would love Trump just as much as real Americans do. You spend so much time bashing America's choices and yet the best plan you can come up with is predicated on Americans somehow making better ones. Well, to be fair, isn't the whole socialist/communist utopia predicated on humans not being humans? No, I’d argue it never really was either. We’re multifaceted creatures, and also rather malleable to cultural conditions. There’s certainly challenges to transitioning to socialism, but most sensible thinkers I’ve read are rather aware of these. Capitalism isn’t merely an economic system, it’s a colossus that bestrides everything and imprints a hell of a lot of cultural attachment as well. ‘You have nothing to lose but your chains!’ is less potent a rallying call if people have been conditioned to see those chains as a natural state of affairs, and be quite fond of em. Things being so internationally interwoven and interconnected also rather complicates things for places who might want to give it a shot. And of course we’ve examples of bad implementations and where that lead as well. Folks who deny that tend to be myopic lost causes, but in my experience they wouldn’t necessarily be the majority, most have grappled with those lessons and how to avoid those pitfalls in some future hypothetical socialism. Broadly I find the charge of socialists being utopian hippies to be massively off the mark. I think the bigger issue a lot of people have, here at least, is that when pressed for a semblance of a plan or ideas on how to achieve it, they don't receive any details. Reading a book or going out and joining a group isn't really helpful. People join groups all of the time. But why would joining this particular group lead us to a socialist culture? What's the next step after? What's that look like from those who have been part of said group? These are needed to paint the picture for some, as you can attest, because not everyone has the time or energy to spend on going socialist club shopping.
We can’t collectively come up with a plan to stop someone like Donald Trump getting elected twice. To meaningfully redress something as potentially apocalyptic as climate change. To shift the US to the kind of universal healthcare most comparable nations enjoy etc etc. To prevent housing costs rising above both inflation and real wage increases etc.
If we can’t even reform capitalism within its own framework and make it slightly less shit, who has a workable plan to supplant it wholesale?
Hell if capitalism did address some of those issues, it probably completely defangs the left for a generation. Most people who aren’t me or GH would take that happily. For them the problem isn’t capitalism itself, it’s just not working in the way they would like. Going back to my previous point that for the majority of people, capitalism is the ‘natural’ state of affairs.
As to a plan of sorts, well exhibit A is convincing people that capitalism itself is a problem, and away from ‘I ultimately like capitalism it’s just not serving me now’. Which is hard to do.
Then I think you need a ton of groundwork. Join unions and contribute with full energy. Form some co-operative companies that work. If you can do that, it becomes that much harder for opponents to claim more equitable company structures are doomed to fail.
It’s a be the change you want to see kind of thing, and that’s fucking hard to do, it may not even be possible in a realistic sense.
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On February 02 2025 00:14 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 01 2025 23:20 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:On February 01 2025 23:14 WombaT wrote:On February 01 2025 04:57 maybenexttime wrote:On February 01 2025 04:43 KwarK wrote:On February 01 2025 04:28 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 02:07 Sermokala wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Its extra funny considering he doesn't follow any of his advice. If anyone is petulantly shitposting its GH. Dude offers no solutions, no open hands to convince anyone of anything. He's never tried to convince anyone of anything other than cynically trying to opine why everyone else doesn't abandon their positions and admit he was right all along. On February 01 2025 02:02 GreenHorizons wrote:On February 01 2025 01:52 Zambrah wrote:
My dude, everyone here has a long history with each other, theres no way you're gonna get any progress with your ideals around here in any super meaningful way, I've shifted more towards your viewpoints over the years as it seems like all of the electoral types here have as much of a plan as they accuse you of not having for dealing with basic shit like political corruption and all of the absurd issues we've had in this country for years.
Petulant, cynical back and forthing is all we have here, that and posting the news, usually cynically. Alternatively, we could be adults capable of participating in a democracy? I'd really like us to be that *eyes glisten dramatically with optimism* On February 01 2025 01:55 Sadist wrote:On February 01 2025 01:03 GreenHorizons wrote:
[quote]
Forget the revolutionary part, you guys need to be socialists ASAP or fascism is going to keep winning while your Democrat politicians collaborate with them.
None of you libs/Dems have a real argument not to be socialists. It was so that you could beat Trump. That failed spectacularly. Nothing stopping you all from spending the next 6 months acting in good faith as socialists just to try it out. Well, nothing except your stubbornly undue hubris.
Democrats have nothing else/better for you to be doing, and I promise bickering/shitposting with oBlade about dwarfs/genitals isn't more useful than developing a socialist worldview in community with your comrades. Can you clarify what you mean by becoming socialists? In the temporary sense and to be probably dangerously reductive, I basically mean approaching everything here with a sort of "how would a socialist I can relate to engage with this" and going from there. I mean look at this shit. He can't even answer what a socialist is without trying to put himself as the example people should be following. He doesn't understand that he lives in a democracy and that people can seriously engage with the one form of government that we have. I know communists and they're at least unafraid to tell people they don't belive in democracy and want authoritarianism. This guy is just scared to tell people how he thinks we should be doleing out power in this country. I agree with Zam on this. The question wasn't, as I understood it, "what is a socialist?" Though if Sadist or anyone else wants a hand finding a socialist they can relate to I'd be happy to assist their efforts. The US has something it calls "democracy", but there's more to democracy in any meaningful sense than ~30-70% of the country voting every couple years (if Trump/the fascists/Putin let you anymore). I'm advocating socialism. Socialism is democratic. I'm not "scared" to tell people we should live in a socialist, democratic country. It's easy to see the difference between how you describe my posts and what is actually in them for anyone reading both in good faith. To that point... I welcome anyone that wants to explore being a socialist while Democrats are busy appeasing Trump/fascists and bickering over ATC dwarfs and such, at least until it's time for them to tell you voting for evil (of the lesser kind) is your only hope (should Trump/the fascists allow it), to my Blog: Socialism Anyone?. The US has democracy. The problem with the US isn't Trump, the problem with the US is Americans. I don't think you have a plan to overcome that. Let's say that 20 years ago a democratic socialist America was the status quo. It would have been dismantled just as easily by conservative media and the breakdown of political norms. Your Americans would love Trump just as much as real Americans do. You spend so much time bashing America's choices and yet the best plan you can come up with is predicated on Americans somehow making better ones. Well, to be fair, isn't the whole socialist/communist utopia predicated on humans not being humans? No, I’d argue it never really was either. We’re multifaceted creatures, and also rather malleable to cultural conditions. There’s certainly challenges to transitioning to socialism, but most sensible thinkers I’ve read are rather aware of these. Capitalism isn’t merely an economic system, it’s a colossus that bestrides everything and imprints a hell of a lot of cultural attachment as well. ‘You have nothing to lose but your chains!’ is less potent a rallying call if people have been conditioned to see those chains as a natural state of affairs, and be quite fond of em. Things being so internationally interwoven and interconnected also rather complicates things for places who might want to give it a shot. And of course we’ve examples of bad implementations and where that lead as well. Folks who deny that tend to be myopic lost causes, but in my experience they wouldn’t necessarily be the majority, most have grappled with those lessons and how to avoid those pitfalls in some future hypothetical socialism. Broadly I find the charge of socialists being utopian hippies to be massively off the mark. I think the bigger issue a lot of people have, here at least, is that when pressed for a semblance of a plan or ideas on how to achieve it, they don't receive any details. Reading a book or going out and joining a group isn't really helpful. People join groups all of the time. But why would joining this particular group lead us to a socialist culture? What's the next step after? What's that look like from those who have been part of said group? These are needed to paint the picture for some, as you can attest, because not everyone has the time or energy to spend on going socialist club shopping. We can’t collectively come up with a plan to stop someone like Donald Trump getting elected twice. To meaningfully redress something as potentially apocalyptic as climate change. To shift the US to the kind of universal healthcare most comparable nations enjoy etc etc. To prevent housing costs rising above both inflation and real wage increases etc. If we can’t even reform capitalism within its own framework and make it slightly less shit, who has a workable plan to supplant it wholesale? Hell if capitalism did address some of those issues, it probably completely defangs the left for a generation. Most people who aren’t me or GH would take that happily. For them the problem isn’t capitalism itself, it’s just not working in the way they would like. Going back to my previous point that for the majority of people, capitalism is the ‘natural’ state of affairs. As to a plan of sorts, well exhibit A is convincing people that capitalism itself is a problem, and away from ‘I ultimately like capitalism it’s just not serving me now’. Which is hard to do. Then I think you need a ton of groundwork. Join unions and contribute with full energy. Form some co-operative companies that work. If you can do that, it becomes that much harder for opponents to claim more equitable company structures are doomed to fail. It’s a be the change you want to see kind of thing, and that’s fucking hard to do, it may not even be possible in a realistic sense.
Thank you for that reply. I truly appreciate it. I think you hit it on the head. I think we can shift the US into UHC, it's just one of those "And I'll drag you screaming with me!" type of deals. It just needs to be done and force fed to the masses. ACA is basically the framework in place, we just need to go further and harder. I'd rather fight and figure out how to get US Democracy going in the correct way, than to blow it to hell and supplant it with something that isn't going to work on a national level. Maybe city by city or state by state, but I don't think it would work nationally to where we are satisfied with it, at least here in the US. It's a lot harder to get the very diverse cultures that live here on the same page, as you mentioned, as they've elected trump 2x.
Everything is doable (climate change might be harder because that's a global effort). Housing is possible by implementing laws and statutes that make it illegal for the housing market to significantly outpace the median income of the state/city. That way, Kansas City isn't trying to keep up in pricing with places like Chicago or Los Angeles. And hold those that break those laws accountable. I don't know the deets, so no one even ask me. I'm just throwing out ideas.
And I don't think that capitalism needs to go away, it needs to fundamentally change to meet the times. I think it's still stuck on the oil baron mindset. If we can't tax the rich, then we eat the rich. Plain and simple.
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