this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2023
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I'm lower-left quadrant but always cop a fair amount of shit from others on 'the left' (nebulous term though it is) for my feelings on capitalism. The people I speak to have never seen anything but corruption, and have a combo of zero faith and utter hatred for it.
My personal feelings are that with strong, enforced checks & balances, capitalism can be combined with socialist policies to create a fantastic standard of living (see Norway), without it becoming cancerous. Unfortunately most of our western political systems (and capitalism is strongly influenced by political systems) seem to be run on a wink and a nudge, an assumed sense of 'fair play' which we all know has been shown to be worthless in recent years.
Strong unions; an educated populace; politicians who actually give a shit; this is what we need. But, capitalism has an absolute stranglehold on the populace of most western countries via print / tv media. The foxes are in charge of the henhouse and the hens are getting shit on.
You're getting shit from leftists because you're doing the "socialism is when the government does stuff" just from the other side.
And referencing the "political compass" unironically.
Well, and the corporate owned media with a hypercapitalist agenda, all the lobby organisations, the lack of proper public education for centuries, red-blue-whitewashed historytelling, the oppression of the black minority, a deeply flawed election system, the imprisonment crisis, and related the opiod crisis, gerrymandering, not enough unions, the fucked up healthcare situation itself...
Yeah yeah two parties bad we fuckin know but talk to us when both sides start hard shoving for the removal of human rights. Talk to us when Republicans stop gerrymandering voting maps because they know it's the only way they'll get elected.
It's not fucking both sides it's one side actively shitting all over the country while the other side gets blamed for it. Meanwhile half our citizens have been so dumbed down that they can't remember any Republican scandal longer than 5 god damn minutes.
bUt HeR eMaIlS!!
BuT hUnTeR bIdEn!!
bUt TrUmPs DiCk Is So TaStEy!!!
You can have socialist policies without being a socialist society. Our (UK) NHS is a socialist policy, free healthcare at the point of use. My country is decidedly not socialist!
Ftfy. Nothing stops anyone from voting for it right now. There's only one side even remotely fighting for it. It's just ignorance, laziness, and hate that keep it from happening.
What matters is the ability the allocate resources according to the needs of us all and that people have confidence in future resources to be happy. Private ownership is contrary to the first; it helps with the second. That is any "capitalism" must be limited to pertonal needs.
Who decides what constitutes a "need"? Will this proposed society be based purely on subsistence?
Aaaaand that's how communism ---> dictatorship
You and those whose needs would cause their needs to go unmet.
"Congratulations comrade, this week you get a new toaster!"
"...my shoes are falling off my feet..."
"We do not have shoes, comrade! This week we made toasters!"
Socialism has many of the same benefits as capitalism. It's also compatible with other systems. A socialist country can trade with a capitalist. I have no issue with slowly moving toward socialist but I don't think there is much to be gained in protecting capitalism.
This I think is a key part of misunderstandings... I'm not trying to protect capitalism, I'm trying to be realistic in how we go about modifying society towards more socialist goals. We're not going to upend the global capitalist systems in our lifetime, I don't think. And imo things are going to get worse before they get better, as wealth continues to be concentrated in fewer hands, as productivity increases due to further automation. I hope the tipping point isn't something that causes massive loss of life, like the collapse of civilisation.
It's like... imagine you have a lake filled with crocodiles, sharks, and jellyfish. We need to get to the other side. Wanting to get there isn't enough, we need a solution. We can just keep endlessly pushing people in expecting them to somehow cross the lake (trying to 'destroy' capitalism), or we can build a bridge across (slowly modify capitalism to have strongs checks and balances). Anyway it's just my personal opinion, I stand by it
I fail to see how anything you said was useful in that I already admitted that it would need to be gradual, so you spent a lot of time on an entirely unnecessary analogy and thensome. However, you offered none of that in your initial comment. You just said that capitalism could still work. If there was any misunderstanding, it was on you for not sharing something you expected people to magically already know.
No need to get pissy, I was just trying to re-explain myself in a way you'd understand.