PreteenCommunist - ask me anything ^.^

Luxichan's response was pretty much spot-on (in fact, I hate agreeing with people as much as I agreed with them). Just three quick little points:

- Sure, revolutions are bloody and horrible and some things are always sacrificed, but would you prefer to live under a relatively absolute monarchy with no democracy? Not only did the American Revolution rid the country of tyrannical colonial rule, it played a major part in spurring European revolutions and spreading liberalism and democracy across the globe and thus a major part in the history of human social development, and for that it was invaluable. Without it, most of the world would have been mired in feudalism for far longer.

- Basically...

As for trade, there won't be any, because there is no market. Economic activity will exist on the basis of co-operation, rather than competition, and be semi-centrally planned like so (this extract is from an FAQ pamphlet I wrote in 2015):

- As Luxichan said, George Orwell was indeed a socialist himself, and the "all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others" law was intended specifically to make fun of how Soviet rhetoric so blatantly contradicted reality (since the whole allegory was a parody of the Soviet Union, which had long ceased to be proletarian in any way, shape or form). Or Soviet doublethink, to use another Orwellian term.

Anyway. Outside of textbooks, which seem to have a weird Lassallean fetish (ew, no, now I have images) communism has nothing to do with everyone being "equal", whatever the heck that's supposed to mean. The closest communism gets to that is that everyone has the same relationship to the means of production, which is also what we mean by "classless society." But I have considerable problems with the meaning of this word when it pertains to people. It's one thing when one is talking about commodities having equal market value (a concept which will be rendered meaningless in communism) but another thing entirely when one is referring to human beings. In communism, humans will be humans. We will all be acknowledged as different and as possessing different strengths, weaknesses and traits as people - which are not due to any arbitrary characteristics - but neither equal nor unequal. I would like to think that this nasty little word will drop out of language altogether.

 

Yes, but there were still plenty of people living in abject poverty.

Tell that to the oil, mining etc. companies which are tearing it apart as we speak and would be doing more if it weren't for regulation.

Then what do people do if they're not paid enough?

No, I mean when the market screws up, basically. All this stuff.

Well I don't expect you to know about the situation of every profession in every country of the world, but in my country care workers etc. work for private companies and are still paid incredibly low wages for doing a heck of a lot of useful work. I imagine this is the case in most countries too; I can imagine the state is a "reserve employer" in Sweden more often than in other countries.

Oh, I thought you meant "corporatism" as in the system Mussolini and others advocated and implemented in fascist Europe (corporativismo). My bad. I've never heard your definition before, though.

How is this different from capitalism? It still involves private property, markets and wage labour.

Hang on a second. You think it's suspect that communists are saying that so-called communist countries which did not fit the definition of communism (social ownership of the means of production, no markets, no state) were not genuinely communist, but then you're claiming that so-called capitalist countries which do fit the definition of capitalism (private property, markets, wage labour) were not genuinely capitalists? Hm.

But then there's Mao and he was one big dick, erm, tator.

Oh, I just love random assertions.

Microsoft, anyone?

It was actually a state actor (well, the EU) which stopped Microsoft from completely butchering Europe's software market.

I don't personally, but I understand that it can both help and hinder capitalism.

 

Not surprised, I'm totes fabulous *flips hair*

Yeah, I know. A couple of members developed a (conspiracy) theory that I was an American bloke in my 30s who used the same online profile of a 14-year-old European girl in multiple locations and wrote in British English just for the hell of it. And also uploaded fake pictures of myself and my bedroom to this site.

Well damn, your memory's good...

 

We've just established that the market does not cause wages to accord to the actual value or intensity of labour.

And no, I don't want anyone to decide anyone's value.

Collectivism is quite simply working, or performing any action, for the benefit of the collective as opposed to the "individual." Nothing to do with governments. It can be anarchistic just as easily as it can be totalitarian.

I have some semantic quibbles relating to the "self", but yes. Acting in one's own interests is generally beneficial.

Understanding in the sense of knowing weaknesses and exploiting them, perhaps, but not in any other sense; and actually this sort of understanding is detrimental to compassion.

Mostly for PR purposes; and it's a pity they won't treat their workers or the third-world countries whose resources they plunder better if they're so generous. And rich people buy disproportionate amounts of shares.

No, I'm sure you're perfectly nice but I don't know you. I linked to the study right there, but here it is again: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10683160310001634304

Hey, if you don't know what something means, just ask. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-cognitivism/

But what motivates people to enshrine a certain moral code as the moral code? What factors lead to the establishment of certain consensa?

 

Countless little things are incredibly important, but in most cases, education combined with desire (which itself is controlled by countless little things) can accomplish any given outcome. I never had mathematical nous, but I do quite well at maths in school because I've been trained well and enjoy the subject.

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The latter; all my friends complain to me about boys sometimes (and I return the favour). I mean, I'm a teenage girl, I'm used to it.

 

It's funny that you say that, because the bourgeois vs. proletariat division applies specifically to a post-feudal, post-aristocracy society which is increasingly (with the demise of the peasantry) divided into two main strata. And some liiittle problems...not all education is equal, public education is generally crap, inheritance is a thing, and by most metrics and in most countries, social mobility is rock-bottom. Even googling "social mobility america/uk/any other western country" would show you that.

There's that goshdarn e-word again.

You mean social-democratic policies, which have also deterred investment and caused capital flight and unemployment. And the 2009 crisis in Europe.

Also, the >800 million people who are starving and even more who are homeless or struggling to make ends meet might prove a slight problem there

They've escaped the shackles of an enormous state within a de facto capitalist system.

Input-output matrices are not complex by any standard, regardless of the "layers" (there's a technical term that slipped my mind) in them.

The centralism of communism has nothing to do with forcing people into things. It's administrative, not coercive centralism. And in any case, there is never universal consensus on a new system. The nobility didn't like it when they were booted out and capitalism was established, but tough luck. The same will happen to the bourgeoisie when communism is established.

Millions and millions of them? And what about the workers who work insanely hard and still can't make ends meet?

 

Can I keep my toothbrush and my toys?

 

Yes, what about them? Are you assuming that they fail only due to circumstances beyond their control?

 

We already live in a classless society. People aren't low earners because they're proles; they're proles because they're low earners (proles and other "classes" are defined a certain way for various reasons), but no one is keeping them down. Flaws in how economies are run today aside, they earn what their labor is worth.

How can you hope to give them more? You understand that you're proposing a centralised system to take and redistribute property and other forms of wealth or value, right? By force.. It won't happen any other way, and few would accept it for reasons I've already gone over.

It's one thing when one is talking about commodities having equal market value (a concept which will be rendered meaningless in communism) - Yeah, try telling that to the people who actually produce those commodities. You are speaking from an ignorant but academic point of view.

 

You don't need state regulations to protect the environment. Private property rights and contracts can handle this more than well.

Change employer or talk to your boss.

I don't see why these things are bad. It is just a natural part of the game you have to accept when participating.

"Missing markets" and "incomplete markets" is quite emblenatic for what you like to call "not so real Communism".

Corporatism requires legislation and restrictions on the market. Capitalism is the direct opposite- A genuinely and completely free market with free trade.

No, I did not say that. I say the average leftist has a poor undersranding of what Capitalism actually and, more than often, they confuse it for corpiratism (you yourself even asked "what's the difference?" just above).

History is on my side, missy.

And this has to be done because?

So, if I understood it correctly, Communists want
- No state
- No market
- No money
Sounds an awful lot like Venezuela. Venezuela is the Commuunist Utopia! Why don't you move there?

 

Believe it or not, I routinely debate this very thing with communists on the internet, quite regularly. It's not exactly that they don't "want" a state, they just believe (fantastically) with Marx that it will wither away after the workers rise like lions and seize the means of production.

They don't need a market either (as you and I understand the term) because no one will need anything because whatever they need will be given to them. By whom and under what criteria is a little fuzzy to say the least.

They won't need money either because everything will be held in common, except for your toothbrush, which you can get for "free" if you need one. Who will be induced to manufacture the toothbrushes? The workers will decide. Which workers? All the workers.

"The vote is 8.63 billion to 1.49 billion: it is decided that Comrade Ritter does not get a toothbrush because he does not need one. Comrade Chef gets a new toothbrush! To be manufactured and shipped, for nothing, by ... drum roll as we pull the name at random from a really big basket ... Preteen Communist. YAY!!!!"

Thanks Preteen! Make it green (the color of money).

 

Well, since adult women are usually nowhere to be found when a woman is required to do a woman's job; i guess i will have to ask a girl:

In an ideal world, what would believe ideal morals should be?

 

So a temporary committee would be sufficient to deal with serial killers who abduct and torture people for fun ? Not all crime comes from being economically disadvantaged (in fact, some branches of criminology are now saying that not even the majority does ). I have to wonder if you aren't underestimating the degree to which Man is A Wolf to Man

Historically, what is the most perfectly communistic civilization that has ever existed?

 

Prostitution will be legal and free after the revolution (didn't you know?), so no one will want to abduct and torture anyone.

 

Then it wouldn't be prostitution if it's free, would it?

But that does bring up another problem. How will especially good looking girls protect themselves from predators with no police?

 

Not only, but when nearly half the world's population lives below the poverty line ($2,50/day), it can't all be "their" fault.

People are proletarians because they're low earners? So people do certain jobs which entail the relationship to the means of production of a proletarian, because they are low earners? That seems awfully topsy-turvy to me; what's more, not all proletarians are low earners. Class in the Marxist sense largely has nothing to do with income.

And with profit existing, which is literally surplus-value extracted from labour, the proletariat can never earn what its labour is worth. Exploiting labour is the only way to make a profit.

I don't understand where the contention is. Yes, I advocate centralisation and the proletarian expropriation of bourgeois property, which obviously will involve force. So?

Economic value has nothing to do with people's feelings. What's your point?

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Except that they don't? How much crap has been dumped into the ocean by oil companies and belched out into the air by factories in countries like the 19th century UK (where businesses were barely regulated)? How many rainforests have been bulldozed for mining? Until the state steps in, businesses trample joyfully all over the environment to their heart's content. Which is why environmental regulation exists anyway.

Changing employer isn't that easy, and it's likely that the new one will be just as bad, especially in a competitive environment or in the same job. And the idea of talking to your boss...why did unions develop in the first place? Because this sort of approach didn't work.

They're flaws in the system which hinder its efficiency - how is that not bad? They can also be remedied through state regulation (which causes a tonne of other problems, too, but no more than a lack of state regulation would have caused).

Kind of. These societies had markets, but throttled them, to disastrous effect. Very similar to your average mismanaged capitalist economy (Zimbabwe for instance).

So genuine capitalism is necessarily laissez-faire, correct? In that case, why did the laissez-faire vs. regulated capitalism distinction even emerge in the first place? Was e.g. Keynes not a capitalist? How about the ordoliberals, who supported a government which would encourage and drive free enterprise, rather than staying out of the market altogether?

This is the first time I've ever seen "corporatism" used to mean that; I've only ever seen it with reference to Mussolini and fascism. I don't see your basis for this meaning, or for the redefinition of capitalism. Which theorists have defined capitalism as anything other than a society with i) private property, ii) wage labour and iii) a market?

History can hardly validate laissez-faire capitalism. The 19th century was not exactly the nicest place. And state intervention was the main engineer of the post-war & 60s boom in the West.

Where did I say it had to be done? "State intervention has both positive and negative effects on capitalist economic efficiency" is what I'm saying. Don't read between the lines.

Correct. Ultimately, that is. Don't forget the transition period.

I hope this is sarcasm.

 

You got me there! I actually think commies don't understand that even in a money-less society, there will still be cigarettes, drugs, and Fabergé eggs in high demand, and people will trade sex for same.

Those girls will have to depend, not on cops, but on what commies call "worker militias," who will have badges and uniforms and guns and mace and the power to arrest. In other words, cops.

 

Yes, it will wither away as society moves towards social ownership of the means of production (socialism) and overabundance, and the revolution spreads, because there will no longer be any need for it. But it so follows that we do not want a state, since the system we advocate is ultimately stateless.

Do we not all have the same definition of "market"?

This is incorrect. No communist has argued that whatever we need should be given to us by some authority, and there is a reason for it being fuzzy: it is a preposterous idea which quite literally no one advocates. Not even the Utopian socialists, whom Marx was quoting when he cross-referenced the "from each according to ability, to each according to need" quotation. The only facets of distribution in full communism which were addressed by the original theorists were the idea of overabundance and the "free and equal association" of producers and consumers, which have led people to elaborate on the (particularly computational) aspects of the distribution end of economic planning, such as in Fundamental Principles of Communist Distribution and Production - I forgot which group published that, but it was an attempt at refining and extrapolating from the rather vague outline of communism and its economic activity drawn out by M&E. Given overabundance, the lack of a state and economic planning which accords directly to human need (as measured, as I mentioned, through mechanisms like stock levels, store surveying, polling, predictions, data extrapolation, specific orders, combinations of specific economic sub-plans etc.) one can imagine that in communism, people will simply go and take what they want from the relevant store. And if it isn't there, there's always the internet, or however the equivalent looks in communism.

Nope, nope, nope.

(1) You're confusing the issue of markets vs. planning with that of who owns the means of production; these are linked but separate. The reason for the lack of money in communism is that there is no exploitation of surplus labour, therefore no profit, therefore no markets, and money is simply the medium of commodity exchange on the market.

(2) Personal property (like toothbrushes, the example capitalists never get tired of using) is not the same as what we refer to as private property (Privateigentum). The latter refers only to the means of production.

(3) I don't know where you got this weird plebiscite idea from, but it sure wasn't any Marxist literature. What would happen in communism is that people would take a toothbrush if they wanted one and help to manufacture them if they wanted to. Y'know, free association. Simple as that.

...What on Earth does prostitution have to do with anything? Everything will be legal and free in communism. That's kinda how stateless, moneyless society works.

I really hope this doesn't sound (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)y or whatever, but with all due respect, if you're serious about understanding communism, take everything you see on the internet with a pinch of salt and read some actual communist literature. And you probably shouldn't make claims about what communists think until you've done that, or you're going to end up misrepresenting our views.

 

I'll reply to everyone else tomorrow since it's really late - or should I say early - and I'm pooped. But Le Chef, please stop making claims about what communists believe. None of what you've said so far has been correct. G'night, I'll elaborate tomorrow when I have some caffeine in my system and some work to procrastinate.

 

And the industrial revolution was absolutely mint. It is just pseudo-intellectual, Marxistoid nonsense that life was before the industrial revolution was sweet and nice, but then "the bourgeoise ruined it all with their stupid revolution." Give me a friggen break.

First of all, there is this one fact. That fact is that government control and regulation obviously is not the solution.

Then stop complaining and do your work!

State is the root cause of every single problem there is. Everything from wars and migration to bad schooling, police shootings and low salaries. Everything!

Mugabe is self-identified Commie, you goofball.

Because the state don't like it when people are having fun.

Crony Capitalism, Corporatism. Whatever you prefer. The market has to be free or it is not Capitalism.

When England started its industrial revolution, the country became the greatest, wealthiest and healthiest country on Earth thanks to laissez-faire. Also, Sweden's infrastructure and economy started flourishing in the 1800's thanks to laissez-faire. It was already an upgoing curve when the government stepped in to take control and credit.

Laissez-faire works superbly.

No, it is not sarcasm, my dear. Venezuela fulfills every single point of the Communist Utopia-checklist;
[x] Transution period (Chavez regime) resulting in
[x] Money loses its value
[x] The government is no more
[x] People don't have to work (because there is no money to earn or jobs to get)
[x] Production has ceased to exist
[x] Evil bourgeoise class and good proletarians are now united under the same social level, classes exist no more. #Equality (everyone is miserable, sick and unclean).

Might Venezuela be the first true Communist country?

 

I said:

Preteen agreed:

And then Preteen said:

Which contradicts your acknowledgment that I was completely right about the withering away nonsense, and which is insulting and hurts my delicate feelings.

 

Sorry, it took some time to get back to you, you know own a business and I am what you communist would refer to as a "bourgeoisie", thanks.

Here is the thing, if a single company fails max 0.0005% of the population is affected while if a single government fails then everyone is affected. What makes you think that the judgement of a government can never be wrong? What makes you think that even with all the information available to us, the government would never ever be wrong? Both companies and governments are made up of people working together, what makes you think that companies suffer from human error, while governments are so perfect?

If that were true, why are socialist countries always behind capitalists countries, both in terms of technology and living standards?

The road to capitalism wasn't started by the people converting to feudalism first, it was started by ignoring the feudal system and creating a new system on their own. Do some research into the Spanish War of Independance (or the Peninsular War), and look at how and why Liberalism came to be. Have a look at the history or Cadiz, and the Cortes. Know your enermy.

For me the way to get to communism is to destroy the government, thus destroying the power of the bourgeoisie. A powerless bourgeoisie is far easier to beat then a powerful bourgeoisie. Once this is done, we wait 200 or so years and decide whether we still need a government or now. Why 200 years, because this will force people to go back to the family model of society, and for the family to take care of each other, rather than big brother.

 

A lot of the world suffers under corruption and dictatorial rule, though. They have larger problems than personal failures under capitalism.

 

I know I quibbled with this already and don't mean to belabor it, but it is difficult to know exactly "communists" believe. Yes, they all believe in a few very crude fundamentals. The proletaire, for example, who must sell his labor to the capitalist-imperialist-racist-etceteraist in order to survive, is underpaid because the capitalist is making a profit off the backs of labor. Profit is "nothing" but a stolen component of his wage. If he would just rise like a lion and throw off his chains, all of his material problems would evaporate (my phrase, but you know what I mean).

Once you get past the sloganeering, "communists" quickly splinter into innumerable sects and sub-sects, like religions (exactly like religions?), and they all hate and discredit each other with venom.

You say state capitalism isn't "real" communism? Maybe not, but I know a few Stalinists who would disagree. Maoism? Leninism? Trotskyism? Hoxhaism? Will the real communist please rise?

Democrats and Republicans, Conservatives and liberals, are pretty ugly towards each other these days, but traditionally they get along fairly well, and you'd never see the Capitalists on this board tearing apart each other's notions of capitalism to the same extent.

Come on over to our side. You'll be happier and more comfortable, rich even with your brains.

 

What do you mean by "a woman's job"?

...I'm probably the last person you'd want to answer any ethical question, much less a fundamental one like this. What do you mean by morals?