Why Socialism (and Communism) Fails and why our society is being destroyed

I'm glad there are other people in the world that realize this

 

Wow I didn't know the owner of these forums was such a naive idealist. Libertarianism and Anarcho-capitalism will never work, because it is human nature to step on others to benefit oneself. Without market restrictions, one small class of the extremely wealthy will control the economy and the political system.

Just look at the United States in the early 1900s, a perfect example of your ideal little society. There were no market restrictions back then, but as a result a few wealthy CEOs controlled everything.

In an ideal capitalistic society wages and working conditions are competitive, but in real life, all the people who control the wealth cooperate with each other and keep wages/working conditions low.

So basically life sucks for everyone except for the top 1% in America. Your little utopia provides the perfect conditions for a totalitarian dictator to take over.

 

The root of all evil is private property. In communist society, means of production will not belong to just a few people; it will belong to everyone. People won't feel suffocated to work, because they won't be alienated. Wouldn't that make your life better?

 

im sorry if this is interpreted as spam but i just have to say it.


i dont think you should be basing any claims on such subjective views about supposedly universal human characteristics.

good and bad are dangerous terms.
I long for a society that bases its moral claims on clearly defined ideas.



my belief.....
man is man.
man has aggressive tendencies.
man has ethical considerations.
man has higher reasoning created by cognitive functions.

man should use this higher reasoning to govern the other two.
some will notice a similarity to Freud's theories.


man should recognize all parts of his being and not base a government on one.

 

'National Socialism' worked very well in Germany, it got them out of a great depression and made the country one of the world super powers in a few years.
However I think National Socialism is very different from Socialism.

 

I have actually come to agree with you, Sythe. I now would consider myself a Libertarian over a Democrat, Republican, or any other party.

I especially agree with how a making health care pubic destroys the system, it's probably what's going to happen in the U.S. very soon, unfortunately.

Generally, I don't believe in absolutes, though. I do not think that the purest form of Libertarianism would really work out, as humans are somewhat of a pack animal, and tend to look to leaders. Generally, I would think that the U.S. government, strictly as put forth in the Constitution and Bill of Rights, would be ideal, though not having grown up in that era, I do not know of unpredictable flaws that this would produce.

p.s You should be president :nuts:

 

Sythe for president.

 

Oh, the irony.

 

@Sythe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_nature#Hobbes.27_philosophy

 

Comunism does not fail. It just can't co-exist with government. Because when it does some people are more equal than others.

== large problems.

You can't have both comunism and government. They just don't co-exist.

 

I don't think that it is disputable that men will often take advantage of other men for their gain. I think it is pretty well established that is our nature. Whether one calls this evil or not is irrelevant. In government men take advantage of each other, and the same can be said for an anarcho-capitalist society.

 

what can be described as a persons nature is dependent upon the environment they are in. if we build a government that emphasizes our aggressive tendencies, you will see them become more prominent. if you build a government that emphasizes our ethical and rational sides, we will see them become more prominent

in a family, people look after one another, the same can possibly be said for Utopia

 

Despite that fact, it is still human nature to step on each other to get what we want.

I want your car, his house, his girlfriend, her job.

Unfortunately no matter what society you put people in there will always be plenty of people that act upon these actions.

 

i say that this part of our nature is so pronounced because it is rewarded in our current society. in business, you are always trying to step on others and become number 1. this is true in many other areas of life.

maybe if we changed our value system to a less materialistic one we would notice a shift in peoples selfish tendencies.

 

I vaule both communism and socialism.

You can not have a free market with billionaires and trillion ares( if that is possible at any point) laying around free cash and misuse of money to either create an ideology, influence society needs and so like. While the trickle down theory as failed ever so miserly you can not help the poor by doing nothing and letting free market arise. Remember, the poor and middle class will ALWAYS uprising and declare war against those evils of society.
People before money- a good slogan on the communist party in the US

Also a good out dated book- Communist manifesto. Karl did point out the flaws of the people within the people and tyrants will arise.

No economic system will work- As with man will always dictate one another with different needs.

 

Sythe, I understand your point and agree with the misconceptions in all political ideas. In addition, humans are by nature, sinful and greedy. Therefore, communism cannot work as the basic human nature arises to shift the power from the people to the de facto group( such as the communist party). In socialism, its just a step away from a communist dictatorship. Most revolutionaries only have a solid plan in taking control, but not actually enacting what they promised to the followers of such a group. Therefore the USSR was doomed to collapse into war or a famine like era even if the U.S.A. and the NATO didn't oppose them. The militaristic opposition to communism was Freedoms stranglehold on the Warsaw Pact: They made them spend money (similar to taxes in the USA, but yet broke the governing body's laws) to improve the military. One important reason that so many people joined the October Revolution in 1917 was that with a war going on and all middle class men and the serfs were enlisted, they're was no people to work in the fields. Thus the fall of the USSR was due to the greed and misconception of basic economic principles: with over half the world refusing to trade with you and the rest in a similar state to you, over industrialization leads no people to farm. Hence repeating ones mistakes some 70 years earlier .

 

Imo socialism is saving our country

 

You live in Greece? I don't know what they're saving, it seems the EU is trying to save their credit rating.

 

I'd first start by expressing my agreement with the kernel of the original post. There is no economic system that is as practically and morally credible as capitalism. Having said that, however, I disagree firmly with your presentation of human nature as being characteristically flawed.

Adam Smith famously said: 'It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest'. Indeed, Smith's position is, essentially, that the market harnesses selfish energies and activities to an end of prosperity. As far as I can see, this also appears to be your position.

It would be foolish to deny that humans are powerfully driven by self-interest. More foolish, in my opinion, would be to deny that humans are motivated and driven in so many other ways too. The world works as it does only because people are not the totally self-seeking agents that free-market economics believes them to be. When considering economics, we must acknowledge that whilst human beings often act selfishlessly, we can also exploit other human motives and get the best out of people. Put simply, if you try to take a simplistic view of human motives and assume the worst about people, you will likely get nothing but the worst from them.

You might find this interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work-to-rule

Italian strikes are known to reduce industrial output, for example, by up to 50%. From this, you can see that all production processes rely heavily on the goodwill of workers to do extra things that are not required by their contracts or exercise initiatives, and taking shortcuts in order to expedite things when the rules are too cumbersome.

If you attempt to deprive a human of their autonomy and dignity by speaking as though humanity's sole motivation is self-interest, you will find that workers will become passive, un-thinking and uncooperative. Any good manager will tell you with no qualms that human motivation is far more complex than the most basic doctrine of capitlaism accepts.