-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Well when you abandon truths like "class is your relation to capital" and replace it with bourgeois junk like "you can be proletarian if you identify by it" then yeah, no one in their right mind is going to agree with that Pepsi Generation level garbage.
OK, let me clarify, then; I was specifically referring to market socialism as a movement within libertarian socialism. The kind where all industry is wholly worker-owned but uses the market in place of central planning. That's one brand of socialism that doesn't get enough play.
I agree with your second and last statements, but I'd argue that... hrm. I'd argue that you're not quite off-base with the first comment, but that it really depends. Like, queer anarchists are all about social revolution, just attacking different issues in a different order. As are some insurrectionary anarchists. Transhumanist anarchists are an odd bunch, but their entire belief system is predicated on the possibilities of radical social change produced by radically changing technologies. Anarcho-primitivists can be on that shit, or they can instead go in the reverse direction and go screaming off blindly into the night, it's a crapshoot. Anyways, what I mean to say with this is that a huge chunk of anarchists emphasize social revolution and destroying capitalism through recontextualizing structures. You're correct in that abolition of hierarchy tends to come first, which is why I tend to think of anarchism as a useful modality through which action can be taken. I tend to like the idea that hierarchies should have to perpetually be proving their use to exist.
Agreed on the first statement. We should really just tell people that Marx meant "Religion is the Advil PM of the masses." And I argue that showing people that it's not just not inconsequential but a big next step to show that religious socialists can be and are a big thing. A lot of people are like me in that they're religious, with a strong leaning towards social justice, who feel upset at the traditional religious status quo ignoring that so much in favor of... whatever fundamentalism is in favor of even, anymore, it's hard to keep track. Reaching out to these people and helping to connect them with textual resources that speak to their issues and their views of what their faith could be seems like an opportunity worth taking. Early Christianity's creation of a communal style of living to follow Jesus's ideals should serve as an inspiration to a lot of these younger believers as to what was possible even with the resources of the time. And the Islamic movements of the 70's can serve as a similar example of what the faith could be to younger Muslims. We've got a lot more of those people on Era than you'd expect.
Oh, of course! But for one, I think that there are ideas in some parallel movements like the Paris Commune that we could really learn from (such as the concept of communal luxury) and that taking the focus away from Marx is a good way to maybe get people to stop and reconsider if they really know as much as socialism as they think they do. Something like critical theory can have a lot more applicability to our current day but it's hard to get people to accept the premise that they aren't just extensions of Marxist thought, especially when they haven't read critical theory, without first showing that socialism as a broad-based movement takes inspiration from more places than Marx.
Well, to my knowledge (which I'll admit is incomplete), many of these movements were nowhere near as radically repressive as the actual Soviet Union-- so that's a start for reasons attention should be brought to them, as evidence of the reality that socialism doesn't have to go that way. Secondly, because their modes of failure were heavily influenced by outside forces, which tends to speak to the reality of the fact that even these state capitalist institutions were more than just pipe dreams in terms of stability. They didn't end in a total collapse without groups with way more resources, experience, and time gunning for them hard. They, even as incomplete examples, refute this idea that socialist ideas inevitably backslide into repression.
Ultimately, I take your premise to be the idea that practical action and outcomes will be the thing that eventually proves socialism to be correct and inspires people to move past capitalism. I agree with this thesis! But it's hard to get a discussion going outside of socialist spaces right now with so many having an incomplete picture right now, yunno? And I feel like we need as many people as possible creating a discourse on this sort of thing as possible, for a plurality of reasons. We need new ideas to combat capitalism, new ways of thinking, and the best way to do that is to bring new people on board with socialism. Is Era the perfect and ideal political platform? Oh hell no. But it's a huge community created on flexible, rapid, decentralized organization that every now and then brings those principles forward to make some good in the world happen, like with that poster who was terminally ill and couldn't get money; or the poster who got kicked out of their home and had no place to stay. Bringing people who have managed to get those sorts of results on board might not bring us socialism tomorrow but it at least seems like a good... yunno... thing we should do, I guess.
No such thing.
If I suddenly own the 7/11 down the street but still rely on factory workers making shit, to sell to me, for me to sell to you, it doesn't matter that I own the store. It's still capitalism. Socialism is "worker's democracy" or "worker owned industry" is a misnomer.
All this stuff here? This is a byproduct of Pepsi Generation Bourgeois thought. You aren't a Socialist or an Anarchist no matter how much you advertise yourself as one. The "supermarket of ideology" concept where you just stroll down the aisle and put on airs of what you find appealing is no more Socialist than deciding whether you like Dr. Pepper or Mr. Pibb better.
OK so, first thing's first. Lemme just distinguish between what I believe and beliefs that I'm aware of. Any "socialist" society to me where you have to justify your existence through labor or face starvation isn't really socialist to me. Having said that, I'm not going to pretend that there are people for whom that is socialism as long as the workers you get your goods from in your 7/11 also own the factory themselves. Doesn't mean I agree with them. These schemes in theory usually have a strong democratic socialist safety net besides with caveats such as UBI, and then we get into particulars of organization or any state-like regulatory apparatus. The market in this case becomes a replacement method of allocating goods as opposed to central planning. Let me ask this: without central planning or a market, how do you determine who needs what and what to make those needs? Asking out of a place of genuine interest, are other methods proposed outside of some kind of Internet-based system where people could fill in what they need?
This whole deal here is actually why I think it would work-- you can find a cited source for a bunch of things and be like... "You thought socialism was this? Well, look at this or that socialist guy, he disagrees with this thing you thought was a fundamental premise." The idea being to get to the point where people are more flexible in their thinking about what preconceptions of socialism could be.
I'm not sure if you're referring to the ideologies I've named or if you're referring to me. But, like... these are discreet communities of often-impoverished people trying to produce radical social change in society by emphasizing particular directions. They are all banded together based on their desire to abolish the state and capital. They approach that end goal from different methods. I... am not sure to what extent these people are picking and choosing what they like best so much as they are creating a base and tradition of literature based on their shared experiences and beliefs. Not that there aren't bougie anarchists who just like the aes and don't really walk the walk, but I'd say these groups are a bit more than just bougie trash. Particularly queer anarchists. That distinct group was made because a lot of the time a bunch of leftist and socialist groups just weren't... practically speaking, looking out for the concerns and protection of LGBT individuals.
Proud socialist.
Individually we are many working together
but as this:
We are a force for change, together closed as a fist.
Individually we are many working together
but as this:
We are a force for change, together closed as a fist.
Good Interview of Chomsky
Its in Spanish:
https://elpais.com/cultura/2018/03/06/babelia/1520352987_936609.html
Google Translator:
https://translate.googleusercontent...700201&usg=ALkJrhhc_8fG_HZefedDM2BiM6E2yx9m9g
90 years old and working amazing
Its in Spanish:
https://elpais.com/cultura/2018/03/06/babelia/1520352987_936609.html
Google Translator:
https://translate.googleusercontent...700201&usg=ALkJrhhc_8fG_HZefedDM2BiM6E2yx9m9g
90 years old and working amazing
Have you tried not being the Socialist Thought Police and stop saying how everyone who disagrees is not a True Socialist? Your attitude is a perfect example why the left is losing everywhere.
If the extent of your Socialism is merely worker managed Capitalism then maybe it deserves to lose.
Instead of being exploited by a boss you get to be exploited by your peers. How progressive.
Instead of being exploited by a boss you get to be exploited by your peers. How progressive.
Last edited:
I mean, I don't disagree. It's just that it's a different kind of socialism than the kind most people know.
So what kind of thing do you like? Parecon? Weirdly some branches of THAT are also called market socialism, reinforcing the general thesis that maybe the biggest problem with socialists is they can't words.
So what kind of thing do you like? Parecon? Weirdly some branches of THAT are also called market socialism, reinforcing the general thesis that maybe the biggest problem with socialists is they can't words.
If there is a market then it isn't socialism. If there are wages then it isn't socialism. If there is work then it isn't socialism. If there is privatization then it isn't socialism.
OK, I think I see the issue here. You're defining what is socialist based on an eschatology-- an end-state. I'm defining socialism in what moves us towards that end state.
When you protest against the idea of worker-owned businesses, you're protesting them as being an end-state to the revolution. Which, yunno what, fair enough. That's a pretty lame revolution. But starting from this capitalist shithole we can call point A, I see workers owning businesses as a socialist move because it begins to attack present definitions of class by removing an individual at the top of the hierarchy who gets most of the capital. Sure, capitalism will inevitably adapt if that's all that happens, likely through a system of seeming-concessions that offer these worker-owned spaces but provide some mechanism for the main thing they were meant to prevent to continue.
Not helping things it that, in my experience, there are plenty of worker-owned locations that are, like... Real In There when it comes to socialism. The ones I keep coming back to are less Mondragon and more, like... the Argentinian factories that got outright seized from their owners, still run, and the workers scare away police trying to raid them with rotations. That's revolutionary direct action a bit beyond just owning the factory.
I dunno. I guess if you expect there to be no interstitial states between capitalism and a market-less, wage-less, work-less, property-less state, there is no socialism but one. That presupposes some near-instantaneous global revolution in my mind, however, and that just seems damn unlikely. I'd argue these groups have a legitimate right to call themselves socialist if they think they're helping reach that state. Everyone's going to have different ideas on how to get to the end goal and even what that end-goal will be. I keep asking you what you think resource distribution looks like in this scheme, after all. Central planning is not a market is not a parecon, and yet every single one of those has called itself market socialism or some derivative thereof. I don't know of any methods of resource allocation beyond those, and I'm interested to know if you have any that fit in with your eschatology or if it's something that reveals itself at the time of said eschatology arriving.
When you protest against the idea of worker-owned businesses, you're protesting them as being an end-state to the revolution. Which, yunno what, fair enough. That's a pretty lame revolution. But starting from this capitalist shithole we can call point A, I see workers owning businesses as a socialist move because it begins to attack present definitions of class by removing an individual at the top of the hierarchy who gets most of the capital. Sure, capitalism will inevitably adapt if that's all that happens, likely through a system of seeming-concessions that offer these worker-owned spaces but provide some mechanism for the main thing they were meant to prevent to continue.
Not helping things it that, in my experience, there are plenty of worker-owned locations that are, like... Real In There when it comes to socialism. The ones I keep coming back to are less Mondragon and more, like... the Argentinian factories that got outright seized from their owners, still run, and the workers scare away police trying to raid them with rotations. That's revolutionary direct action a bit beyond just owning the factory.
I dunno. I guess if you expect there to be no interstitial states between capitalism and a market-less, wage-less, work-less, property-less state, there is no socialism but one. That presupposes some near-instantaneous global revolution in my mind, however, and that just seems damn unlikely. I'd argue these groups have a legitimate right to call themselves socialist if they think they're helping reach that state. Everyone's going to have different ideas on how to get to the end goal and even what that end-goal will be. I keep asking you what you think resource distribution looks like in this scheme, after all. Central planning is not a market is not a parecon, and yet every single one of those has called itself market socialism or some derivative thereof. I don't know of any methods of resource allocation beyond those, and I'm interested to know if you have any that fit in with your eschatology or if it's something that reveals itself at the time of said eschatology arriving.
"Being your own boss" is a cornerstone promise of Capitalism. It's not the beginning of Socialism.
I'm not interested in capitalists calling themselves socialists.
To quote Lenin:
I'm not interested in capitalists calling themselves socialists.
To quote Lenin:
Scroll up or maybe back a page and you'll see my opinions on predicting the unknown or applyin an ideological outlook upon what we can't control.
OK, agreed, but how do you generate a praxis around these ideas, particularly if you think predicting the unknown is bad and see these strategies as applying an ideological outlook on externalities? So like, I find this weird because even if I don't identify with market socialism myself, I still support worker-owned shit because it disrupts the accumulation of wealth to the present capitalist class. That's an action item. If a worker-owned business succeeds it actively fucks the capitalist class by showing them to be redundant and keeping them from making money-- at least, if the pay structure is flat and management decisions are democratic. Sure, that isn't the end of socialism, that's not a desirable end state for the human condition. I wouldn't even call it a step in the right direction, because that implies anybody knows the right direction. It's a useful move, though, within the context of the current capitalist class, even if it doesn't prevent a new one from forming on its own. Doubly so if the place of work has been expropriated. Furthermore I concede that, typically, it doesn't in any way actually attack global inequality. For that an intersectional approach is needed as is focus on developing world outreach, technologies, and development. But that, again, is a discrete action item. Like... sure, I don't know where we're going. I reject teleology. But like... I think there's value in being able to say which things assist in overcoming current obstacles and developing an approach based on that. We're faced with trying to create concrete results-- namely, a stateless post-scarcity society where people are cared for without any particular expectation of deriving useful work for them in return. To get there we have to, by some means, nullify the influence of the capitalist class, whether state capitalist or otherwise. Since capitalism constantly adapts there's no singular solution to help, and there's no existing methods of opting out and starving the beast, so a many-headed approach seems warranted.
I will also point out... a parecon is hardly the same as either centrally planned economy or market economy. It's an allocation mechanism, and so long as infinite resources aren't available resources, well, need to be allocated. I dunno about you, but I think accelerationism is dogshit. Ergo, given our present dogshit situation methods of minimizing the impact capitalist oppression has on our lives is a worthy goal-- and that necessitates a conception of a direction that is away from the current status quo. I'm not asking for unity in those ideas, even, just acknowledgement in the validity of trying to say "hey what's less shit than the free market as it is right now? What disempowers the people presently making policy decisions that are focused on creating a permanent underclass with a nominal yet marginal political voice they can't actually use?"
OP
OP
I don't think House is wrong in a strictly theoretical sense. His abrasive was just doesn't win him many supporters to his side.
Now I can already hear you saying "Socialism isn't 'a side' that you 'win people over to', it's not something to be branded or advertised, that's bourgeois thinking" my friend, but at the same time I would think that it's easier to get people to agree with what you believe to be a more correct understanding (and preferable to do so since it would prevent people from spreading what you might otherwise call falsehoods about socialism) if you dont tear into their jugular each time they say something wrong/that you disagree with.
Of course there's also a value in ruthless criticism. But it depends on the audience.
Now I can already hear you saying "Socialism isn't 'a side' that you 'win people over to', it's not something to be branded or advertised, that's bourgeois thinking" my friend, but at the same time I would think that it's easier to get people to agree with what you believe to be a more correct understanding (and preferable to do so since it would prevent people from spreading what you might otherwise call falsehoods about socialism) if you dont tear into their jugular each time they say something wrong/that you disagree with.
Of course there's also a value in ruthless criticism. But it depends on the audience.
If me simply pointing out that "Capitalism with a Human Face" is still Capitalism amounts to "tearing into their jugular" then I dunno. Maybe don't wrap your sense of self worth into it. It's not an identity. "Lifestyle" is a product of Capital in itself.
I'm not even particularly insulting about it, and I certainly don't get personal with it. But sometimes you have to point out the obvious. Especially when people are missing it or talking over it. Like...
"If a worker-owned business succeeds it actively fucks the capitalist class"
Owning a business makes you a Capitalist. That is merely describing Capitalist Competition in a Capitalist environment. If pointing that out makes someone angry on a personal level, all I can suggest is maybe they get a better understanding of class and class relations. Why should a Socialist get angry when Capitalism is pointed out?
I'm not even particularly insulting about it, and I certainly don't get personal with it. But sometimes you have to point out the obvious. Especially when people are missing it or talking over it. Like...
"If a worker-owned business succeeds it actively fucks the capitalist class"
Owning a business makes you a Capitalist. That is merely describing Capitalist Competition in a Capitalist environment. If pointing that out makes someone angry on a personal level, all I can suggest is maybe they get a better understanding of class and class relations. Why should a Socialist get angry when Capitalism is pointed out?
OP
OP
Not that, I was referring to times where you've come off as dismissive of other people's views because "you're not a socialist" or "you're a careerist Trot" (or something like that). I think your criticism is usually worthwhile but the tone can be offputting to some people.
You know that your rejection of sociolism as an ideology is a minority opinion and likely a form of disinformation, right?
Part of why I hate even getting involved with "socialists" is that so many are so mentally disordered that arguments in good faith are difficult. It's heavy on denunciation and light on anything useful.
Which is why fascism has always won. Because we're too busy infighting.
I don't know if that's true. Fascism isn't a next-order reorganization of the management of the productive forces as much as it's a modern reinterpretation of classic oppression. It plays on traditional, nationalistic, and sometimes religiously based biases against certain groups of people.
Fascism is a step backward and those are always easier than steps into new forms. IMHO.
The in-fighting is caused by the same unknown qualities of a total material reorganization.
Personally I think the most important theoretical point about the idea of socialism is it's defined most simply as working people like ourselves and the people who work are the ones who run society and the important question for socialists is how we can reach that goal, and the ultimate realization of it all is that we don't concede anything to the capitalists, the problem with a lot of these reformist ideas is i think it's important to acknowledge that we need to fight and organise ourselves to win reforms, especially in the context that current industrial relations laws within capitalism are absolute garbage, but a nicer capitalism with a human face is never ever going liberate the working class, plus everything about the history of social democracy and the subsequent rise of neoliberalism has basically proven to me that you can't ever keep nice things under capitalism, and it's why a lot of this current discourse around UBI is plain cringeworthy to me.
It's not cringy to me, Lafiel. UBI could be the difference between homeless or not for me. Because things already get quite bad, quite often for me. So if it got introduced here, it would be godsend. (as well as for other people on the bottom, like me)
OP
OP
The Soviets believed - actually quite rightly as Lysenkoism ironically proved - that science, being like any other field of work, was not necessarily "pure" but could be influenced by the ideological beliefs of a given society. Genetics was taken to be an example of that, a pseudoscience promoted by social Darwinists in capitalist society who believed in nature rather than nurture. Lysenkoism went the opposite way, and it fit with the whole "struggle" idea of socialist society. It was also stupidly wrong.
So, and I don't mean this as a callout to you or anything but it was a perfect example of a case where this happens, I do think we need to rethink our idea of "the workers" to not be ableist and to cover people who, well, can't work. This is not a new problem in the slightest, but it is a very specific issue I have with various described visions of socialism that do over-emphasize the action of "work" (by, say, organizing completely around the idea of worker syndicates or composing social councils with workers from various industries) and its a large part of why I waffle back and forth between describing socialism as "when the workers own the means of production" and "when the means of production are publicly owned". Just something I'd like people to be mindful of
Hence the problem when you box yourself into sloganeering and concerning ownership.
Because the idea that people arn't pure blank states that are shaped by the environment, society, ideology is a direct threat to communist ideology. Genetics is that
OP
OP
Well, it's a threat to Soviet ideology. Communism is just an economic system based on stateless non-market distribution. Genetics aren't incompatible with that. People and things can be shaped both by nature and nurture.
Would you say lysenkoism is the most disastrous form of pseudo science or was eugenics worse?
I'd argue we're still seeing the bad aftereffects of eugenics and people are still stanning for eugenics (see The Bell Curve) so probably Lysenkoism is still second place.
Eugenics seems to keep cropping up even after we think we've squashed it so its definitely the more pressing concern to me
But many would say the Ukrainian and Chinese famines were a result of Lysenko
OP
OP
Lysenkoism is certainly the dumber idea since it has no basis in science. Eugenics, in the sense of "promote beneficial traits and reduce negative traits" is a sane idea, it just got abused horribly. Hopefully when genetic editing becomes common we can do it responsibly, but I doubt it.
1> Lysenkoism became a thing because Lysenko primarily falsified his findings for political gain and because genetics/modern biology had not yet become the final and real "discipline".
2> Eugenics will never go away. The Nazi's pretty much ruined it as a word, but we still practice eugenics today. Genome studies, reproductive/prenatal studies and assistance, etc. The UN sometimes tries to "rebrand" it as something else to avoid the Nazi baggage associated with it.
The Chinese Famine had little to do with Lysenko and all to do with lack of basic understanding of symbiosis, evolutionary altruism, ethology, and especially ecology. They literally had no idea that destroying the sparrow population would increase the population of the locust.
For a couple hundred years before the democratic and Communist revolutions the ruling class basically never taught science, math, etc.
2> Eugenics will never go away. The Nazi's pretty much ruined it as a word, but we still practice eugenics today. Genome studies, reproductive/prenatal studies and assistance, etc. The UN sometimes tries to "rebrand" it as something else to avoid the Nazi baggage associated with it.
The Chinese Famine had little to do with Lysenko and all to do with lack of basic understanding of symbiosis, evolutionary altruism, ethology, and especially ecology. They literally had no idea that destroying the sparrow population would increase the population of the locust.
For a couple hundred years before the democratic and Communist revolutions the ruling class basically never taught science, math, etc.
To be fair killing all the sparrows is rad as hell and if it takes a famine to stop having birds, maybe a few million peasant deaths is worth the cost.
Did any of you guys check out the Black Panther documentary i linked ?
It has been. It's saved lives, including my own.
Last edited:
Are we talking about the US?
Minimum wage in the US is poverty and starvation wages.
It's not any better here. But even as low as it is. It's still helped stayed me from being homeless. (as i'm sure others)
Here are the minimum wage rates over here for the last few years.
Year |25 and over| 21 to 24|18 to 20| Under 18|Apprentice|
2018 | £7.83 | £7.38 | £5.90 | £4.20 | £3.70 |
2017 | £7.50 | £7.05 | £5.60 | £4.05 | £3.50 |
2016 | £7.20 | £6.95 | £5.55 | £4.00 | £3.40 |
2015 | £6.70 | £6.70 | £5.30 | £3.87 | £3.30 |
The formatting fucked up when i posted this. Sorry. I hate it all nicely aligned and everything. But not matter how much i change it in the edit. It won't change when i post.
I found this to be a pretty interesting read, especially since the American left's foreign policy often seems to be defined in what it is in opposition to (admittedly, the American state is so responsible for so many bad things that!) https://nplusonemag.com/online-only/online-only/the-lefts-missing-foreign-policy/
So, again, do you want to consider living on the absolute brink of existence as something we should roll out and start considering the "basic" life necessity and hard define what we consider "universally basic"?
A UBI isn't going to be free money and whatever you get via a UBI is going to be taken away else where with the added caveat that measured subsistence is universal and livable.
I reject the idea that "allowing" someone to live at the poverty line meets their needs and that life should be defined by it.
That said, its not a fight that I need to make and I understand why it's an issue for others. As always, finding comfort under Capitalism and reforming it is its own struggle that has its own merits.