Capitalism vs. Communism

M

MandaG

New member
@ JakeCJB

I think you are making the misstake of equating communism with socialistic-anarchism (or syndicalism). Communism is an ideology that intenRAB to replace the capitalistic class with the political class in order to make the transition to a classless society possible. Social-anarchism believes the transition can be done without the interim regime.
 
Actually, anarcho-communism was the ultimate goal of Marx. However, Marx did believe it had to occur through the transitional phase of rule by the workers as a class. Marx did not believe this would be achieved by the dictatorship of one worker's political party, ruled by one person, but by democratic means.
 
Hello being a new user I can't say i'm very knowlegable about things and such but i want to add my two cents to this collective bank of knowledge.

The ideals of Communism are as such, a perfect classless socioty in which all are equal;in education, in rights, in economy and purpose. These ideals clash with the basis of Capitalism or also Social Darwinism. The ideal of the rich superceding the poor is crucial for capitalisms function, the same ideas in "survival of the fittest" in social darwinism. Isn't it odd that Hitler, a Nazi used such ideas to state the superiority of Aryan men and women over slavs. These worRAB could be translated onto the Capitalist idea of the rich(Aryans) making the poor(Slavs) extinct because of superiority in money(Genes). The treatment of rich and poor in the capitalist bastion of America is most evident. Never will you see a CEO being arrested as a poor minority on the street. Never will the people be heard except when their senator might bring their opinion to congress. The president doesn't listen to the people and only in a classless socioty can the people's voice be heard. Communism or at least pure Communism can achieve such hights of freedom the dictatorships of Josef Stalin and Mao Tse-Tung cannot be seen as proper versiions of Communism, as America is not a true Democracy. These Nations China, North Korea and Cuba are corrupted by greed in the Upper echelons of their governments not the idea of that government. The world cannot daemonize an idea for how it is used in some nations. As previously stated America's first settlers were using a Communal system that benefited all. This history isn't as widley known as Stalin's purges and Tienamen Square. The collapse of Communism led to only chaos in Russia and the former republics under it's control. The unifying property of Communism cannot be ignored, making all equal will only bring humans together as one, not divided by class or race. Letting well known misdnomers of Communism as Stalin, a man abused as a child lashing out at the world, and Mao, a man fighting the corrupt control of both the Nationalist chinese and Imperial Japan to give his people freedom. These men who were branded as maniacs were doing what they saw as right, just these two men; not the nations they represented.

You want to know what ruined Communism? It was it's competition with a more developed capitalist socioty that stood for an idea itself inplausible, that all are created equal. Sound farmiliar? SounRAB an awful lot like Communism to me. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics cannot be seen as a perfect communist socioty nor can the People's Republic of China, but what they were created for, the equality for all under a unified nation is what communism is all about. Not some Red Menace waiting to explode but the question of "What if...?" What if our socioty was truly equal.
 
This is really an easy, empirical question. Both of these systems aim for material welfare, so which has more? Obviously the capitalist countries. (By capitalist I really mean economies with a mix of capitalism and government since no pure capitalist societies exist).

The capitalist countries are by far the most productive and wealthiest; they enjoy the best health and longest life expectancy. Even the poorest people in capitalist societies enjoy a standard of living much higher than most other in the world.

Individual rights flourish in capitalist economies as well. Name me a communist society that cherishes individual rights. The Soviet Union? Communist China? North Korea? Cuba? Hardly. The communist ideal of equality and deomcracy and prosperity gave its adherents neither equality nor democracy nor prosperity. Communism is a discredited social system and was one of the worst mistakes in human history.
 
Really? How do you explain Martha Stewart's dilemma then?


Not some nations, ALL NATIONS that have tried communism have failed miserably. It is anti-human nature.


Back up.....the Pilgrims lost 50% of their population under the Communist Mayflower Compact. It wasn't until each man was given his own plot to work as he saw fit that the colony thrived.


Gov. Bradford and the surviving Pilgrims learned a valuable lesson from the Mayflower Compact; Communism doesn't work. And it doesn't work because human nature is such that without personal motivation and personal reward, man won't be altruistic and do his neighbors' work.



As I stated above, Communism can't work because it is an intrinsically flawed notion. The weak will never equal the strong; the slackers will never produce as much as the ambitious. The intelligent will never dumb down to the level of dullarRAB. As long as people have differing levels of abilities, knowledge, work ethic, etc., there will be inevitable conflicts from within. The bold will dominate over the timid. The reason that you can't find a good example of Communism is because there isn't a good example to be found.
 
Yes, through nationalise the means of production and dispel false class consiousness. The side effect of this would be the creation of a political class. Marx argued that this class would be far better than the capitalistic class as it represented the interests of the working class. However, Marx argued that with time, this political class would formulate interests of its own and would have to be torn down (violently and perhaps even bloodily) to achieve the utopian state of class-less and state-less society.



Problem with Marxism is that it assumes that there is only class-interests. In a socialistic state there would only be one interest of worth, and that would be the interest of the working class and thus a one-party state is quite logical. But I`m sure that Marx would have argued for a democratic socialistic state, had he seen what happened in Soviet Union.
 
Early, weak and defenseless humankind survived by adopting primitive communism. These early small hunter-gather societies shared everything equally, among every member, including knowledge, and rely on one another equally, in order to survive. There was no leadership. No other animal had ever developed such a system of equality. Perhaps this is why humankind was able to survive and develop much more, especially its brain, compared to all the other animals. The following is a link, long, but worth reading...

Modern studies of surviving hunter-gatherer and early agricultural societies have upheld the essential core of Engels' account. Hunting-gathering peoples live in what are usually called 'band societies'--based on loose knit groups of 30 or 40 people which may, periodically, get together with other groups into bigger gatherings up to a couple of a hundred strong. There is no formal leadership, let alone class division within these societies.
http://pubs.socialistreviewindex.org.uk/isj65/harman.htm

Another link that discusses the Kibbutz system in Israel...

It has been argued, however, that an unstratified society is a possibility. Such a society, in which everyone is equal, is known as Egalitarian. The Kibbutz system in Israel is a good example of how this could work. Roughly four percent of the Israeli population live in one of the country's two hundred and forty Kibbutzim. The Kibbutz system was established in 1948 when the Jews reclaimed Israel from the Arabs, and was an attempt to escape from the individualism and competition that prevailed in most of the developed world. It is run according the Marxist principle-"to each according to need, from each according to ability".

Most kibbutzim are agricultural communities with a population ranging between two hundred and seven hundred people. All property, including land, buildings and produce, is communally owned between the members of each kibbutz. All commodities are freely distributed to members as and when they are needed, and all services are freely available. Children are all brought up and educated communally. There are no economic differences within kibbutzim as money is not used and general assemblies are held to make any major decisions. This may sound like an unstratified society, but Eva Rosenfeld, who studied a kibbutz in 1974, argues that there is some stratification.

Her studies concluded that there were two distinct strata within kibbutzim- "Leader/ managers" who were elected to run the kibbutz and to allocate jobs and "Rank and file" who undertook these jobs. Although the leader/ managers did not have any economic advantage over the rank and file, their jobs earned them more prestige. She found that there was an uneven distribution of "emotional gratification"- there was stratification but, unlike western societies, it was based on power and prestige rather than material wealth.

Rosenfeld's findings show that, even in a society with no economic differences, there can still be social stratification. Within the kibbutz system there is comparative equality but it is not truly unstratified. It is possibly the closest thing there is to an unstratified society in modern times. Tribal societies could also be said to be classless but, even in these situations, there are differences between individuals based on their status within the tribe- there are usually leaders and followers.

Social hierarchy can be based on the possession of different qualities in different communities, and some societies are more equal than others, but none can ever be completely unstratified as there will always be inequalities in certain areas, due to individual differences.
http://www.hewett.norfolk.sch.uk/curric/soc/lowerSixthA.htm
 
No nations have tried it. Primitive man used it. The equal sharing of resources, and especially the equal sharing of knowledge, is how we survived, and advanced more than other animals. How is it anti-human nature?



It wasn't until the native Americans were generous and compassionate enough to share their knowledge of how to cultivate corn and squash that the white colony thrived.



What about barn raisings? Personal motivation comes from within, obviously, and it is not lost by the co-operation of others. In fact it is enhanced by the co-operation of others, being that we are such a social species.

The above I quoted, seems to me to be a man is an island type of argument.

One's motivations and abilities are just a potential, which won't be truely realized without co-operation from someone else.



This sounRAB like a mantra you are merely parroting. Does money, which the capitalist sytem is based on, induce talent, ability, knowledge, strength or intelligence in the human? I don't believe so.
 
The problem is galton, that a communist goverment is meant to be so interweaved that if you are able to eliminate corruption in both feilRAB it is a strong possiblilty that communism would better capitalism. Just by the fact that most of the reasons that these goverments did poorly is the fact that the officials in charge were there for them selves. Consider this example, 10 men that have worked together for a long time get into a bar fight with 10 men exactley like them except for the fact they have never met. Who would win? It's obvious that the group of men that know eachother will work much better together than the other men. This in the end will allow them to win. Now take a society where everyone is completely equal economicly, socially, and educationally against a society if diverse people, poor and rich, and dumb and smart. Which society would prosper? Remember, there is no corruption at all in either society. It would take the largest fluke ever to take down the first society while the smallest gust could tear the other society to shreRAB. Think about that before you judge against any economic theory.
 
Primitive man didn't co-operate with others outside of his family.

The settlers knew how to shoot deer and turkeys, fish, etc., without the Indian's help. You don't travel across the ocean in a rickety boat, settling in a new world without knowing something about how to survive.

Were they community barns? No, they were privately owned barns. You helped your neighbor so that he would be there to help you. That was the deal then.
...


I do. Money is the motivating force behind most of mankind's advancements.
Thomas Edison didn't invent out of altrusim; he did so for profit, as did Henry Ford, Bill Gates and millions of others. To believe otherwise is to be naive.
 
I think what you are saying is: 1) communist societies didn't work because the leaders were selfish; and 2) communist societies could be superior because they would make people the same, and sameness leaRAB to unity and strength.

My response to your first point is that communist leaders again and again have been corrupt, selfish, and have mistreated their people, so there is zero reason to think any future communist society would be any different. We must base our views of how things are based on historical experience, not on some theory or ideal. Communist ideology on the ground does not work--it has always led to a hell on earth. Capitalist society recognizes that human nature always tenRAB toward self-oriented behvior, but it channels that energy in a constructive direction. Communist ideology misunderstanRAB how people operate.

That leaRAB me to my second point. History also shows that you cannot make all people the same. No society in the long sweep of human history has ever had all people even close to being the same. People differ naturally, and it is impossible to snuff that out. An absolutely essential element of evolution is genetic diversity. That is the entire reason for sexual rather than asexual reproduction--so that instead of being an exact genetic copy of the parent, each child gets a unique combination of genes, making each individual on the planet different from every other. You cannot snuff out diversity no matter how repressive the government is. It is utopian to think otherwise.
 
Just like in "The GoRAB must be Crazy" people have romanticized hunter-gatherer societies, imposing on them the dreaminess of their utopias. Of course they didn't have sharp, formal hierarchies because who neeRAB that with a small band of relatives? Nevertheless, there were looser status hierarchies in hunter-gatherer societies based on age and gender and ability to hunt and fight. The idea is simply not true that there were no followers in these groups and leaders who dominated decision-making. As groups grow larger and larger, the hierarchies get more formal, steeper, and more complex. It is a universal law, and it is no accident that you post examples of tiny societies that have zero relevance to the six billion people currently living who live in the average society of say 30 million people.

As for wealth inequality, of course there will be little of that when NO ONE in the tribe has ANYTHING!!!--as we see in hunter-gatherer societies. So yes I will concede that we can at least approach wealth inequality if we wipe out all material possessions. Zero can easily be equally divided among a bunch of people.
 
In my opinion its a pity we can't expect more of the human race than corruption. There have been places though that have thrived under a communist rule, butregretfully it was not even close to large enough success for anyone to see the benefits. All I can say is that its a pity that we can't get past our own selfish desires to make our selves better.
 
Prehistoric man probably behaved very similarly to prehistoric animals, survival of the fittest. Mating, eating and everything else was probably controlled by the strongest of the group.
 
Communists and anarchists don't believe in nation states, but tend to believe in organization at a local, responsive level.



Sure zero can be. Who is advocating not having anything or wiping out all possessions? All that is produced can be used.
 
Yes, people were connected by blood, but no other animal developed such societies of equality.



They obviously didn't know about the land, and they didn't have a lot available to them. I believe they landed in the wrong place, too.



The research and development for the major advancements in computers, science and technology and pharmaseuticals, in the last 50 years, has come from public, not private, funRAB. The computer was invented and developed as the result of public money. Bill Gates in fact, didn't want to invest in the development of the internet, because he saw no profit in it. The railroaRAB were public money, the space program is public money.

Generally, capitalists will not risk a lot of their own money for a long term major project which may have a social benefit. They are indeed greedy, and speculative, and are looking for quick, short-term profits.
 
Hi TeRABter,

Where were those places?

Back in the '60's the flower children sought to fight the establishment by forming small communes where they would live in peace and love forever, sharing resources under the great communist ideal (To each according to...blah blah). After about two weeks most had discovered the "relatives are like rotten fish theory" instead, and quit the experiment to quietly blend back into the good old capitalist system, where they reside today in unimagined wealth.

Don't fret too much over the failed idea of communism. We are who we are, our natures won't be changed any time soon.

regarRAB
 
Here's an example of what I was talking about from the auto industry. If you look at the paragraph at the bottom I pasted, you will see this doesn't just apply to Canada, but to the U.S. as well...

In a Wednesday morning announcement at the General Motors plant in Oshawa, Premier Ernie Eves said the auto sector will be able to access $625 million over the next five years for research, training and development.


Ernie Eves

While the money is targeted for the auto sector, other sectors will be allowed to compete for it too.

A government news release said the money was for "large-scale investments."

"Our government is committed to keeping Ontario's economy competitive, which means creating an economic climate that attracts investment and creates jobs," Eves said.

Eves called on the federal government to match the province's money
 
Excellent point. The assumptions about humans found in communist philosophy run completely contrary to the theory of evolution, and it is an amazing contradiction that Marx respected Darwin so much. How did we magically go from something like the gorillas who duke it out and maybe even kill each other over the females, the winner getting a harem to dominate, and the losers getting to wander to look for a lucky opportunity to sneak sex with a unprotected mate--how did we get from that brutishness to the peace-loving commune of selfless saints? Primates like gorillas show sharp hierarchies.
 
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