What do Europeans think about socialism and communism?

Could you expand on this? Such a short sentence makes things vague.

And expand on this too please...

 

To understand socialism there needs to be study of political economy. That will lead, for example, to a realisation that socialism is both more efficient and more equitable (but unlikely, given the consequences for corporate profit). Capitalism is typically cheered by the gullible right. See, for example, the 'Fox News' effect where statistically significant voting effects are secured. They are easily herded as they have demands that are easily twisted: from the "immigrants, woe is us cos of immigrants" to those convinced by the 'free market' myth (which makes the Loch Ness monster look likely)

Lefty: Concerned that European integration will further the exploitation of labour
Righty: A nationalist cretin

 

Specific authoritarian policies in Socialist European countries are things like universal health care. This is a mandate by the state to make others pay for the health care costs that they don't use. For example a free man in a free capitalist country is made to pay for mammograms, and under a private plan they only pay for the health care costs associated with their infirmities only.

Taxation is also a good example of socialism because everything can be privatized in capitalism, but I concede that point since no country has shown a good example of universally privatizing everything to show what free market capitalism can really look like fundamentally.

 

National health care isn't socialist (given it isn't about ownership and control of the means of production). It is, however, more efficient. This illustrates the innate coercion demanded by right wing Americans

 

Universal health is the norm in every developed nation (with the notable exception of the USA) on earth, and for good reasons. It is by far the most efficient method of providing health care for all the citizens of a nation. To agree with your conclusions in respect of UHC, would be to imply that every developed nation on earth is stupid and authoritarian, and that only Americans display any intelligence in this area. It is also to imply that no other people have any say in the governance of their respective societies. Do you know of any population in any nation employing UHC who are marching in the streets to adopt the American system?

Can you explain the privatised version of taxation? How public works, roadways, railways, fire and disaster relief services, immigration services, the postal services and defence (to name just a few) would operate under the exclusively private sector? Taxation has been described as the price of civilisation, it has nothing to do with political ideology.

 

Government spending is NOT Socialism. Socialism is about the means of production.

 

First: Full of sense.. Socialism is a totalitarian ideology that forms the basis of Communism, Fascism and Nazism.. the most important communist, fascist and nazis came from socialism... never from liberalism...

The communist los t the war in 1949 and many of them had to live in East Countries... Thats is what is clear.. I don´t speak about Metaxas, but the Greek Civil War (1944-1949) or if you prefer 1946-1949... I knew greek living in the East from 1949...

Trosky was the architect of Red Army... the initiator (together Lenin and Cheka) of Red Terror and Comissar of Foreing Affairs, Military and Naval Affairs, President of the Petrograd Soviet (when the bolsheviks gave the Coup).. and yes, He killed many thousand people more than Mussolini, of course...

Why don´t you accept the reality? Socialism, Communism, Fascism and Nazism are the SAME ideology..Do you know what is Totalitarism? Nowadys we are living in West Democracies something like the begining of Totalitarism...

Do you now what you had to do if you want a one-day trip to the countryside in USSR, for example in 1952? in the Socialist Paradise?...

Go to live to North Korea, the Real Socialist Paradaise.. and and say in this forum that communism is not totalitarian

 

You are boring and you are repeating the same nonsense .
North Korea follows Juche , you know what this is?
The British blockaded and bombed Athens, not even Hitler did that.... but anyway your political and historical fallacies are too many , you will need years of study to get over them and stop sounding ridiculous . You make me feel like i am spanking a child so i am done talking with you.

 

interesting that Andrew Johnston head of the UK stop the war coalition and communist party member is an open supporter of North Korea. his nasty leftiy firends appear to haveno problm with it

 

I don't think that martin76 is making an invalid argument and in my encounters with him; he is a knowledgeable poster.

The core tenet is that of self-reliance.

In 1850

You mean Hitler didn't bomb and bombard cities?! Yes he bloody well did.

b

What can I say. Rude, ill informed and uncivil.
And of course you've been wrong about a great many things and not just in this topic either.

 

Given this is a basic error, there was no reason to continue with your post. You cannot construct valid argument around invalid political economy. Just can't be done

 

The privatized version of health care in free enterprise capitalism would be a system where everybody works and charity covers the welfare of those who are too sick. A private company can build roads, railroads, fire fighters, postal services, why does civilization have to depend on the government or socialism?

 

No, that's civil behaviour, 'socialism', 'communism', 'nazism' (all the -ism ideologies) have led to the opposite of civilisation as history shows us.

The big problem with 'socialism' is when people stick such a label to their mind and feel that everything is safe and normal. They are part of a new group with new collective thoughts (works almost like a religion) about social subjects (in a new society that is normal in their mind and views)
One big happy family until reality kicks in, a lot will wake up, start to see what happened to them. This happened to many German people in 1939, about fourty percent finally saw what happened to them, that awakening was too late (but when such an awakening is in time (awakening can be done by propaganda via mass media or by bureaucracy, or tyranny, it moves upward in hierarchy like a wild fire), it can lead to the same historical trouble, because it's a mass awakening, and politicians or other leader figures can take advantage from that situation.

 

I asked you to define a privatised version of taxation (which, unless I am mistaken, you seem to be advocating) - we are all aware of the privatised version of healthcare and how well that works for everybody in a given society.

Of course I am aware that private corporations can build roads and hospitals, fight fires and deliver the post, but what happens to those who cannot afford these services?

 

There is no such thing as taxation that is privatized, that only comes from socialism. A society free of socialism and runs on capitalism would be one that private corporations take on the services of government.

In capitalism if one works they can afford to pay for these services without subsidies by a socialist government. For example a company that has workers who need access to roads to get to labor for their profits would make sure it is affordable for them to come to work because that is in the interests of their business.

 

Public good provision? Because of non-rivalry and/or non-excludability, markets fail by definition and there is underprovision

 

He made an argument? when ? unless parroting uneducated nonsense and pasting from laughable sites is what you consider valid and knowledgeable .

I don't remember asking you but yes it is autarky and this is why they don't want relations with the rest of the world.

You are almost 100 years wrong

Hitler didn't bomb Athens.

Of course i am rude , uncivil and a hothead but tell me where i am wrong?

 

I think Mutkmekep refers to Athens 1944 when Mr Churchill and the British army prevented fortunately the Communists established their totalitarian state in Greece.

Regards

 

6.- Cult of Personality

its origin is in the mists of time, the cult of the leader, the chief of the tribe.
It is a religious feeling: The workship of Savior, a secular and pagan worship... like we can see in the workship to Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Polt Pot, Ceaucescu, Hoxha, Mussolini, etc etc etc

7.- Inequality of the people

Opposite the democracy and Christianity advocated the equality of persons, secular religion of totalitarianism establishes anunequal base. This inequality comes by race (National socialismus) , nationality (Fascism) or political affiliation (case of socialism and communism). In the socialist society to belong to the Party was a kind of privilege, a kind of elite.


8.- Mysthic of Youth

Totalitarianism is considered itself as a new system (biological notion) that replaced the old and decadent bourgeois democracies ... Totalitarian parties have paid much attention to adolescents, the teenagers are framed within Youth organizations (Pioneers in socialist regimes, Balilla in the Italian Fascist, Hitler Youth in the Third Reich)..
We can´t ot forget that the first song to the youth is a fascist song: Giovinezza, Giovinezza


9.- Propaganda

propaganda and Terrror are two sides of the same coin, violence is part of the propaganda as nazi theoretical Hadamowsky said. The continuous indoctrination is part of the role of State.

Hitler (Hitlers Tischgespräche) as Lenin thought that a lie repeated a million times ends transformed in Truth , because it becomes a truth assumed by the social body ... deny this truth is deny the society.

The intellectual capacity of the masses is very limited, and easily penetrable through repetition ... totalitarian require high concentrations in public places like squares, either in Nurnberg, Rome, Moscow, Berlin or Beijing ... acts of affirmation, acts of faith..

Why today the fascism or nazis totalitarism is “ugly” and however many people defined to themselves without blushing like “socialist” or “communist”? Propaganda...victims of propaganda and lack of critical spirit..

10.- The Party

The party monopolizes the state, society, culture, there is nothing outside the Party .. either in Moscow, 1920, in Rome, 1922, in Berlin, 1936 or Havana, 2014, the Party and State is the same. The party has its own army, whether the Blackshirts, the Waffen SS or the Red Guard..


The identification – Leader - Party - state - Society is absolute under Stalin or under Hitler or Mao or Ho-Chi-Minh...


11.- Permanent Illegality

The law is a superstructure (Marx) became useless. Neither the leader nor the party nor the State are subject to the laws .. The Nazis not even repealed the Weimar Constitution, Stalin had the cynicism to draft a constitution in 1936 that never was observed

Besides the judges and prosecutors are instruments of the Party carrying out policies of persecution "potential" criminals, not for acts committed, but by speculative threats to "State".

12.- The Secret Police

Judges and prosecutor are members in the Secret Police... Gestapo in Germany, NKVD in Russia, GAB in North Korea, Securitate in Romania, Stasis in DDR etc etc... secret police has absolute power: killing, torturing, disappearing etc

13. The Terror

Suppression of "enemies of the state" and a way to paralyze the minds... the nazi terror: Auschwitz, Dachau, Maidanek etc etc or the Red Terror: Polt Pot, Cheka, Trosky, Mao, etc etc.

There aren´t any differents between Socialism, Communis, Fascism or Nazism, the same ideology, the same totalitarism.

Please,do not use manipulation marxists means with me ... I know all of them ... Best argues, say what essentially differentiates socialism and fascism, communism and Nazism ...

 

Fascism is based around the theory of the elites. That is completely inconsistent with socialism. The suggestion that socialism and fascism are based on the same ideology is clear drivel. For example, market socialism is easily embedded within the Austrian ideology. The authoritarian personality is also inconsistent with socialist attitudes.

 

Comlete nonsense. funny how this person who thinks he is so more intelligent than the rest of us spouts so much drivel. Fascism is about Govrnment control of all aspects of society -somthing Socialists are also keen on. Socialists are always authoritarian.

 

I already know that you don't know political economy. Theory of the elites is a crucial aspect of fascism. Its also wrong to refer to 'government control of all aspects of society'. That is a cartoon view of fascism. For example, consider Nazi Germany and the paper by Buchheim and Scherner (2007, he Role of Private Property in the Nazi Economy: The Case of Industry, Journal of Economic History, Vol 66, pp 390-416):

Private property in the industry of the Third Reich is often considered a mere nominal provision without much substance. However, that is not correct, because firms, despite the rationing and licensing activities of the state, still had ample scope to devise their own production and investment profiles. Even regarding war-related projects, freedom of contract was generally respected; instead of using power, the state offered firms a number of contract options to choose from. There were several motives behind this attitude of the regime, among them the conviction that private property provided important incentives for increasing efficiency.

And its just fact to note that the authoritarian personality, as a psychological experiment methodology, has no common ground with socialism.

 

Are you talking of Fascism or National Socialism or are you such an imgeue that you conflate the two as identical. Indeed such is the poor vocubulary that the left equips itself'fascist' is your standard for everything.

ONLY you think you are the authority here. You back an entriely discredited political theory. All you confim is that you have the mind of a 2nd year sociology student.

I

 

I've referred to both. The problem is that your cartoon views aren't consistent with political economy. Note that you can't actually respond to anything typed. Suggesting socialism is authoritarian is cretinous, as shown by the failure of the authoritarian personality to model socialist attitudes