West Germany v East Germany (3 Viewers)

[HumanDichotomy]

West. Definitely. Living under a puppet govt. that promoted their twisted version of 'communism' would have been awful.

 

[Riet]

Yeah fuck that real communism is way better

 

[ashie0]

germany is bad ass. i'd love to live there.

 

[Riet]

germany is bad ass. i'd love to live there.

I will.

 

[loquasagacious]

Yeah fuck that real communism is way better

Yeah gotta get me some of that authentic communism.

 

[Iron]

 

[Fish Tank]

well the jew was the inventor of socialism and communism. So I wouldnt be surprised to see the jews on this forum vote east.

Fail troll.

 

[Got2Kno91]

Its all about balance people!

Pure capitalism doesn't work, and pure socialism (aka communism) doesn't work! There's got to be a balance.

If you go too far to the economic right, you get countries like the USA which have extremely serious economic and social issues (NOT referring to financial crisis either, this is applicable for many decades now). USA may have a high GDP per capita, but income inequality is woeful (worse than some 3rd world countries), and so the top say 5-10% distorts that figure beyond belief, while you get entire slabs of the country in poverty. You get entire CITIES like Detroit that are no-go zones, and even in the best cities there are entire portions of it you don't want to go. The pitiful lack of welfare drives people to commit crime to get by, and entrenches entire new generations in the poverty cycle. You get people DYING from lack of adequate health care due to its privitisation. This sort of extreme capitalism benefits around 15% of the population, and no one else.

On the other hand, on the extreme left, the former USSR was so incredibly socialist it restricts the freedom of individuals to 'climb the ladder' of success, and stymes the wonder of free market choice. However, at least in the USSR (excluding the hell of Stalin) EVERYBODY gets fed, educated, (basic) housing. The lack free market also destroys the efficiency of economy as well, however, meaning that GDP per capita does suffer. Note that I don't consider the USSR to be a good example of socialism, however, due to the totalitarian nature of its implementation there (thanks to Stalinism). It got 'better' in the latter years, but it was too late

Then you have nations like Australia. Australia, in my opinion, gets it pretty close to being perfectly economically balanced. You've got an adequate welfare safety net, and yet the free market is alive and well, and relatively unimpeded. The sucess of the Australian model is manifested everywhere you look: high human development index (we're 2nd now, below #1 Norway and above all other nations, including those of the so-called 'social democratic scandanavian model'), one of the highest life expentencies, low unemployment, respectable income distribution, good scores in investment surveys, and high GDP per capita. Furthermore, you've got universal healthcare and public education, and yet you have a private alternative to both. There are failures, admittedly: there are so many people who MILK the welfare system beyond belief that its disgusting, and of course you've got the indigenous situation (however, no amount of socialisation/welfare is going to fix this anytime soon). Also, it'd be nice if Australia were more socially liberal. That is, more gay rights and acceptance, elimination of racism, none of this nonesense with scapegoating Muslims, more overseas aid, etc. It can get pretty socially conservative out there.

 

[redmayne]

Social democracy is the best there is.

While, for obvious reasons, I would never condone communism in practice, you have to acknowledge the ideals of Marx and Engels, what they were trying to achieve. It's just that it's so so so impossible to put into practice, just goes against human nature...as in the desire to become a tyrant in an autocratic position of power.

Of course West...no question.

EDIT: Third Way ftw

 

[loquasagacious]

Social democracy is the best there is.

While, for obvious reasons, I would never condone communism in practice, you have to acknowledge the ideals of Marx and Engels, what they were trying to achieve. It's just that it's so so so impossible to put into practice, just goes against human nature...as in the desire to become a tyrant in an autocratic position of power.

Of course West...no question.

EDIT: Third Way ftw

There is no such thing as 'works in theory doesn't work in practice'. If that happens then there is a mistake in theory, and in the case of communism the mistake is fundamental to the theory. Communism does not work for humans. Communism does not solve the economic calculation problem.

So we should applaud Marx and Engels because they had good intentions* even though by thinking communism would work they made a monumental mistake which directly killed tens of millions of people???

In my opinion mistakes of that scale are unforgivable. It is perhaps even more disgusting though that in the face of the overwhelming evidence that people still advocate for 'real' communism. Real communism is what Russia had, that's how it really works. Failing to learn from mistakes is stupidity at the best of times, failing to learn from a mistake of this magnitude is nothing short of lunacy.


*Unless you were bourgeois in which case their intentions were anything but good.

 

[Riet]

communism can't work on such a large scale, absolute power and that.

My dad lived on a kibbutz at one stage in the late 60s/early 70s. He said it was great except for the arabs shooting at you when you drove into town. I'm not even being racist they literally got shot at sometimes.

 

[redmayne]

There is no such thing as 'works in theory doesn't work in practice'. If that happens then there is a mistake in theory, and in the case of communism the mistake is fundamental to the theory. Communism does not work for humans. Communism does not solve the economic calculation problem.

So we should applaud Marx and Engels because they had good intentions* even though by thinking communism would work they made a monumental mistake which directly killed tens of millions of people???

In my opinion mistakes of that scale are unforgivable. It is perhaps even more disgusting though that in the face of the overwhelming evidence that people still advocate for 'real' communism. Real communism is what Russia had, that's how it really works. Failing to learn from mistakes is stupidity at the best of times, failing to learn from a mistake of this magnitude is nothing short of lunacy.


*Unless you were bourgeois in which case their intentions were anything but good.

Perhaps this is my fault for not being clearer, but I don't support the idea of 'works in theory doesn't work in practice', not at all. I merely meant that Marx and Engels were supportive of the working class and the oppressed, who at that time in society were getting the rough end of the stick, so to speak. And to a disgusting extent.

They didn't support or outline genocide in their theories, far from it, how could they possibly have known that would happen. So it's unfair to attribute that to them.

But, I agree, that is the exact reason why communism (any form of it) should never be revisited. The only way to test whether a theory works is to put it into practice, and it failed the test. Monumentally, obviously.

 

[Riet]

so ur dads jew?

No not at all. Infact now he sympathises with the palestinians because israel is too right wing for him. He used to know hebrew though.

 

[Empyrean444]

So we should applaud Marx and Engels because they had good intentions* even though by thinking communism would work they made a monumental mistake which directly killed tens of millions of people???

I don't really think it is fair to blame an author for how future people use/interpret/abuse his work, especially considering that this can obliquely take away responsibility from the real perpetrators of such atrocities. For instance, as far as I remember, while he no doubt advocated a prolerarian revolution, I'm not sure he really wanted a monstrous police state of the likes of USSR or China. Moreover, while he was crucial in forming a lot of the technical principles behind Communism, he did not simply 'invent' the ideology itself. While there were certainly a few who claimed to be directly influenced by his actual writings (Mao I believe was purportedly so) a similar form of pro-proletarian and (probably) revolutionary politico-economic stance was bound to emerge, imo, due to the problematic socio-economic conditions of the time. While many of his principles (for instance the deterministic rubbish, the idea that class is the central or sole driving force behind social/national/etc change + history, and that a govt can fully manage the economy with efficacy) are obviously false, at the very least his writings have undoubtedly been crucial in increasing our understandings of history and human society/progress in general. Tbh, I actually think it is a very ambivalent and equivocal issue.

But this of course isnt to say that I support a Marxian political or otherwise stance.

 

[Riet]

Newton is right in theory so we should disregard einstein.

 

[Silver Persian]

I wonder if Zeitgeist will come back for this topic:

http://community.boredofstudies.org...mmunism-greatest-evil-unleashed-humanity.html

 

[dieburndie]

Its all about balance people!

Pure capitalism doesn't work, and pure socialism (aka communism) doesn't work! There's got to be a balance.

If you go too far to the economic right, you get countries like the USA which have extremely serious economic and social issues (NOT referring to financial crisis either, this is applicable for many decades now). USA may have a high GDP per capita, but income inequality is woeful (worse than some 3rd world countries), and so the top say 5-10% distorts that figure beyond belief, while you get entire slabs of the country in poverty. You get entire CITIES like Detroit that are no-go zones, and even in the best cities there are entire portions of it you don't want to go. The pitiful lack of welfare drives people to commit crime to get by, and entrenches entire new generations in the poverty cycle. You get people DYING from lack of adequate health care due to its privitisation. This sort of extreme capitalism benefits around 15% of the population, and no one else.

This is such a distorted, inaccurate perception of capitalism and how it applies to the U.S. economy. The fact that this view is so widespread continues to reaffirm my opinion of the average human- vacant, useless and incapable of independently drawing basic conclusions from the available evidence.

Even if your claim that "pure capitalism" doesn't "work"(?) is true, you have absolutely no clear examples, anywhere in the world in the time since the collapse of communism, to base that claim upon. No, the U.S. won't suffice here.
As far as adhering to the fundamental principles of free market capitalism goes, the extent to which the U.S has failed is glaringly obvious for anyone inquisitive enough to look.

The definition of a free market is unambiguous. It is the corollary of trade undertaken between individuals, separate from interference through coercion. The government of the modern state is the agent of such interference, it exists with the intended purposes of regulating and controlling the consequences of market exchange perceived by some as undesirable or dangerous.

Therefore, it must be concluded that with a greater government presence a state shifts to the "left" (away from a focus on the market). The inverse is also true, that minimising the role of government shifts it to the "right" (market based).

True capitalism requires government to be as limited as possible.

Taking this into account, how exactly can you justify the U.S. as your definitive example of capitalism in action?

The U.S. government being notoriously unhelpful to its citizens in the way it spends money doesn't change the fact that it is a state gripped by a massive, sprawling array of regulation, protectionism, taxes, welfare, corporate welfare, nationalism, international military aggression and almost every other deformed footprint left by relentless beauracracy.

INCENTIVES WORK. The U.S. has consistently incentivised crime with its drug war and regulation that stunted the availability of legal employment in the poorest sectors in the country. It incentivises insurance companies to keep premiums incredibly high with legislation that requires healthy young people be covered under the same schemes as morbidly obese 55 year old men with genetic heart conditions, or not purchase insurance at all. Every industry is incentivised by the power vested in beauracrats to form lobbies, that then campaign for the government to distort the market further by regulating in their favour, at the expense of smaller competing businesses lacking the same resources.

The U.S. has been the most dominant influence in the actions of the WTO, IMF and world bank, all of which have continued to select areas and industries in the developing world to promote market liberalisation where there is a clear identifiable benefit to developed economies, at the same time refusing to do the same thing where it could most benefit the poor nations targeted and lift millions out of poverty. The Doha round of WTO negotiations has been incredibly telling as to the real intentions of the U.S. (and the evolution of neo-"liberalism" as a whole), and the extent to which these conflict with the expansion and growth of truly free markets.

Everything you mention that is apparently indicative of the failure of capitalism, is in reality almost entirely an outcome of irresponsible, self interested government. This is illustrative of the many shortcomings of statism, specifically corporatism. The argument that these things are attributable to market liberalisation, and therefore form useful evidence in criticising true capitalism, cannot stand up to any scrutiny whatsoever.

 

[JonathanM]

well the jew was the inventor of socialism and communism. So I wouldnt be surprised to see the jews on this forum vote east.

Yo James, your affable fake racist sentiment, covering that tender identity shines out like a beacon <3

k.

A Muslim was the inventor of the Quran, yet can it be said that true Muslims misinterpreted that? Same can be said for Communism, except it wasn't the Jews who misinterpreted it, so you can't really say that at all. Terrible example.

Nah, I'm just fucking with you, Marx was a fucktard, so was Lenin, but Trotsky was "a four kind son of a bitch, but the greatest Jew since Jesus Christ."

I'm sorry, I have my Russian Revolution exam on Thursday. I'm fucked.

But yeah. West good, East bad. Although the lack of food and education would have kept the lasses thin and in place.

 

[zstar]

I vote Poland.

 

[loquasagacious]

I vote Poland.

Yeah I heard that they thrived under communism....