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"Communism has poven track record of working"
More like a proven record of not working. How many communist countries are still around today? How many of those are places you would want to live? If they are communist they are also heavily authoritarian. At the end of the day communism "works" if you only believe what the state propaganda tells you. The reality is that forcing people into jobs and trying to eliminate competition ends up hurting diversity of thought. It is no surprise every communist revolution is a violent one. Add that to the fact that the farms completely fell apart and were not producing much output and you have a disaster that has to be covered up.
but have you considered that the West makes countries not communist by uhhhhh, making them poor? once you're poor you stop existing. PLEASE DO NOT LOOK AT CUBA. DO NOT LOOK AT VIETNAM. DO NOT LOOK AT LAOS. DON'T LOOK AT THEM, STOP IT, THEY DON'T REAL.
Cuba: Heavy US Sanctions.
Vietnam: Heavy US Bombing campaign.
Laos: Heavy US bombing campaign.
Basically any socialist experiment you can point toward, almost certainly you will also find either a US war, coup, or sanctions.
Yeah, you can use Cuba. The embargoes are stupid.
But Vietnam and Laos have recovered from the wars. Vietnam has one of the world's fastest-growing economies. Laos is more difficult due to its size, but it has free markets with Thailand and China, and the Laos government is even beginning to open up more expressive freedoms for people due to the presence of Thai trade.
also you'll find communist nations also putting sanctions on the US. It's not much of an argument though, since their sanctions are obviously weaker.
The point is that it's the US intervention is causing them to "not work", not on their merits themselves. If I firebombed every red house in the neighborhood and they got rebuilt at being blue, we wouldn't say red houses are naturally prone to combust and fail, right?
But they are working. They're poor, standards are low, as are rights and freedoms, but they do work. You can become a citizen and experience communism exactly as it was described.
What is the intervention of Laos and Vietnam at the moment? I couldn't find anything. The closest I could find is a defence deal, and that's about it.
You don't level a country's infrastructure and have it be globally competitive overnight. I beg you to include a crumb of materialist analysis into the equation.
I never said they needed to be globally competitive. If possible, I think every nation should transition to being self-serving, renewable, and entirely self-sufficient with their resources.
Communist nations can exist unconnected to the rest of the world's trade. Look at North Korea and Cuba as examples. Not particularly nice places to live. Both nations have very little international trade, but they still exist.
My primary point is that all of these nations are functioning communist states; although poor when compared to the rest of the world, they are still functioning. You can still get citizenship and live out your communist desires to the fullest extent of their laws. You will hate it, but you can live it.
See, that's my problem with tankies. They're all fabulously rich. I know this since I'm in their circles and have talked to many on a personal level--yet--None of these rich kiddies actually give a shit about advancing communsim. They can give all of their vast riches and higher education to these communist states, give them that mighty dollar, that western brain, but they don't, they just refuse. Instead, they prefer to live out their days aimlessly fantasising about how nice it would be to see everything fall apart (who doesn't?) instead of putting boots to the ground and getting shit done. Most of the time they even go against their own ideals, like supporting the proxy wars of arab oil barons or hypercapitalistic Russia. For their arguments over materialism, there sure is a lack of it.
I beg you to include some comprehension when replying--evidently lacking as you blissfully ignore my mentions of these nations' modern trade and supply, pity.
It's pretty clear from your comments that you consider communists and tankies to be one and the same, and don't really know much about communism in general. These tired arguments have been done to death, there's no point litigating this stuff with someone who comes at this with with proud ignorance of the subject matter. Until you grasp at least the contradiction inherent in the phrase "communist nation", you're just wasting people's time.
Great rebuttal dude! You sure showed me!
"nuhuh"
It's not worth my time to continue with this thread after this, you're obviously a deeply unserious person, but I'll spend a little time sifting through the scattershot arguments and deal with them...
I never said they needed to be globally competitive. If possible, I think every nation should transition to being self-serving, renewable, and entirely self-sufficient with their resources.
Because every nation has every resource and information they could possibly need to run a modern society. A rare earth mineral mine in every country is what I always say! /s
Beyond that detail, your first paragraph is effectively:
The second is just you giving anecdotal accounts of people you absolutely know and they're certainly rich (sure).
Have you considered that your theoretical person that holds this belief...
- Probably does not know the native language.
- Will leave behind people they love and care about to move away.
- Would be very costly to upend their life.
- Would live somewhere less well off based on (see above).
- Would rather attempt to influence their country to be better or more equitable (in their opinion).
- Assumes they can even become a citizen to begin with.
The problems are systemic, not based on individual failings. Even if these people were 100% real, I do not care.
Most of the time they even go against their own ideals, like supporting the proxy wars of arab oil barons or hypercapitalistic Russia. For their arguments over materialism, there sure is a lack of it.
This is the most disingenuous strawman framing you could possibly concoct of someone's position.
deeply unserious? all along? What a waste of time, I thought we were having a nice chat but if you want to resort to being deeply unserious, then sure.
I will be deeply unserious in return, don't get mad, it's deeply unserious, no serious business here. This is all very unserious, a very big unserious. no seriousness here, no sir.
Once you're ready to be deeply serious, tell me and I'll unban you and restore your belittling comments and insults, and then we'll have a nice serious discussion where we can talk about ideas. Hopefully come to conclusions and mutual understanding of one another's experiences and opinions, like serious people. Or you can carry on being deeply unserious. It's up to you.
For a second I thought you were a tankie
i believe there is an important distinction between communist and tankie
From a economics perspective there is none. A communist may not necessarily endorse genocide but there is very little evidence to show that communism works in practice. It pretty much is exclusive to authoritarianism. Again that is simply history.
that is a good point
It isn't really my own. You can find paper from PhD level experts who have studied economic systems extensively
Though, real talk. I do think communism will become standard in the future, but not in our lifetimes, of course.
Frankly there is very little evidence to support that theory. The problem with communism is two fold. First, it removes the drive to improve processes. Second, it is highly vulnerable to people to game the system. People will always find a way to get more for themselves and because there is little incentives compared a regular market they will not work harder at there job.
The workplace is ruff and it is definitely is very unpleasant at times. You have to work to find a job and sometimes the job is just miserable. However, it forces the best performance out of everyone which is something communism fails to do.
Well, I believe in the future EVERYTHING will be automated. Economically, how would you compete against a machine that makes a machine that makes a machine that makes a machine (-infinitely-)?
I think humanity will move on from material desire and become hyperspiritualised as it's the one thing the machine cannot do and cannot be given. Wall-E or the Matrix basically, pick your poison.
There are a lot of potential futures, such as:
- Star Trek - humanity can automate everything, so people follow their passions
- Matrix - machines take over
- Cyberpunk/Fifth Element - same problems as today, just modernized
While I would like the first, I think the last is the most likely.
You have to work to find a job and sometimes the job is just miserable. However, it forces the best performance out of everyone which is something communism fails to do.
However, it forces the best performance out of everyone
Have you ever in your life seen a single minimum wage worker?
No offense, but you've eaten capitalist propaganda pretty fucking hard. Your comment tldr could be "pull yourself up by your bootstraps", and the irony is that you probably don't even consider that sentences ironic.
Second, it is highly vulnerable to people to game the system.
That's much more inherent in capitalism, because communism by default would require regulation whereas capitalism strives to get rid of it. Which is also why a lot of communism ended in authoritarian regime.
First, it removes the drive to improve processes.
The drive for novelty exists regardless of the economic system, it's universal in humanity.