The pandemic showed us just how slow the global ruling class to move through the stages of grief, often getting stuck in denial (“this isn’t happening”) and bargaining (“can’t I just reopen one teensy little giant Tesla factory, pretty please?”).
The climate emergency is a sterling example of how “market forces” are incompatible with the continued existence of a human-habitable Earth.
Cons like “carbon offsets” are trivially corruptible and instantly become “markets for lemons,” where the least effective climate measures produce the most profitable (and therefore most common) carbon credits, driving out all the good ones.
Market-based climate measures are where Gresham’s Law (“bad money drives out good”) meets greenwashing. Every promising financial vehicle designed to harness markets to save our species becomes a scam.
Take “Environmental, Social, and Governance” (ESG) funds, pitched as a way to save for retirement without annihilating the planet you’re planning to retire on.
These were once so promising that they panicked the finance sector, so much so that the world’s carbon barons convinced Trump to propose a law making it illegal to direct your investment dollars into an ESG.
It didn’t happen, because Trump is administratively incompetent and easily distracted. But carbon criminals are very competent and good at staying on-task. Rather than banning ESGs, they simply corrupted them, turning them into another form of greenwashing.
Writing in USA Today, Tariq Fancy calls ESGs “marketing hype, PR spin and disingenuous promises from the investment community” – and he should know, he founded and ran the ESG program at Blackrock, the worlds largest asset manager.
The ESGs you’re sold are stuffed full of the world’s worst polluters, from fast fashion companies to (not making this up) giant oil companies. *Oil companies*!
ESGs are blowing up, with sales nearly doubling over the past year.
The SEC’s new Climate and ESG Task Force" will “proactively identify ESG-related misconduct.” If history is any guide, it will fail. The most profitable green investment strategy will always be investing in polluters while pretending otherwise.
As Fancy writes, the solution to the climate emergency isn’t asking the public or business to do capitalism differently. As with the pandemic, the answer is regulatory, coming from democratically accountable states, not the autocratic satrapies of the corporate world.
“In response to the pandemic, we’ve learned that only top-down government action, such as forcing the closure of high-risk venues and mandating masks indoors, makes a real difference. A ‘free market’ will not correct itself or fix the problem by its own accord.”
The consumer movement was born at a time when competition made companies sensitive to things like boycotts. Consumerists realized that they could skip the tedious, unreliable legislative process (where corporations could always outspend them) and hit companies where it hurt.
That’s not the case any more and it hasn’t been for decades. While consumerists were focused on market pressure, corporations successfully lobbied for new antitrust standards that allowed them to eliminate competition through monopolistic mergers.
Once companies eliminated competition, boycotts stopped working. Every time I post about Amazon’s abuses, someone tweets that we should just spend our money better, voting with our dollars. Which sounds great, until you realize that every tweet generates revenue for Amazon.
By definition, you can’t shop your way out of a monopoly. If you don’t believe me, hit your local grocery aisle, where two companies – Unilever and Procter and Gamble – are responsible for nearly every product on sale.
The “cruelty free” brand is made by the same company as the “maximum cruelty” brand. The “organic” brand is made by the same company as the “Oops! All Additives” brand. The “low packaging” brand is made by the same company as the “padded with spotted owl feathers” brand.
When Procter and Gamble buys up some beloved local organic babyfood brand or a scrappy keto meal startup, they trumpet the acquisition as “giving consumers more choice.”
If Procter and Gamble does something you hate – marketing caged-veal smoothies or whatever – and you protest by buying the “plant-based” I-can’t-believe-it’s-not-veal smoothie, chances are, you’re still buying a P&G product (and if not, it’s probably Unilever’s).
Corporate America was once very afraid of consumer movements, but it’s been decades since boycotts or other spending choices were capable of effecting real change. It’s time to stop thinking of ourselves as ambulatory wallets whose only way of acting is spending.
Structural change comes not from how market actors behave, but how markets are structured. The rules for markets matter more than the decisions we make under those rules. Our consumer power is irrelevant, but our citizen power is essential.
The path to a better future lays through state action, through leaning on your lawmaker (and agitating for electoral and campaign reforms), not through endless agonizing over your joke of a 401k or the things you put in your shopping basket.
So the terrible problem with capitalism is that some times there’s over production and then the market crashes and regulates out again? How awful.
Also, Marx can screw off.
That’s not what it says at all so I’m guessing you saw the name Marx and immediately closed it.
Why is enforced scarcity a new concept to anybody ? This shit it’s the new- is not a fucking ghost story or a fairly tale
Restaurants at the end of shifts throwing out the food that hasn’t been sold/ordered and not even letting the employees take it home: enforced scarcity
Grocery stores making foods ridiculously expensive to the point where nobody can buy it , the grocery let’s the food go bad and throws it out: enforced scarcity
I could go the fuck on but u pro capitalist shit heads who mindlessly believe the shit you’ve been told since you were a kid with out ever daring to question it would still sit up here and bring up irrelevant shit
Exactly.
To be fair though isn’t this also an FDA thing?
imo all the things on that list should be fixed. you have an excess of product, give it to people in need. but them not doing that doesn’t mean the system causing that excess (capitalism) is inherently bad. i’d rather have excess in the world and be fighting to stop people throwing it out than nobody have enough
Shoplifting on this website is directly correlated with communism.
There are no successful communist societies, I’m sorry.
Shoplifting is objectively stupid, because it, if it harms anyone from a big company, it’s the employees, and if it doesn’t effect anyone you objectively wasted your time.
And anyway, a lot of what I see people lifting on here is shit you don’t need like makeup (yes, there are studies saying that looking nice equals more job opportunities, but to survive you don’t need it) or other beauty supplies.
On beauty supplies, I have a difficult natural hairstyle and I don’t do a lot with it and I still get compliments, even though I don’t want them.
Like, if you legitimately can’t afford food or clothes (not can’t afford designer clothes, though, or to eat at a fancy restaurant) and your job legitimately does not pay enough, then TO AN EXTENT I could excuse you shoplifting. But that doesn’t make it legal or moral.
Yeah, I’m back to that idea. First off, communism on its own would probably end up with a totalitarian government, because humans are fickle creatures who would probably be corrupted by the power. Because if I understand correctly, there is only one ruling group. Also, power corrupts. I’m sorry, but there would be NOTHING, absolutely fucking NOTHING preventing the group in power from taking it all for themselves, or at least, more for themselves. Russia, for example. Bolsheviks. Any group in history has needed a leader. Even if they worked together, someone initiated it, thus being a leader.
And anarchist communism, that’s a whole new thing. How would anarchism work large scale? Without an authority, it wouldn’t! And it wouldn’t be anarchism at that point, would it? No. Smaller groups tend to deteriorate without a leader, or need a leader for them to work. I legitimately don’t see how it would work, without becoming a hive mind with very little individual thought. At least in capitalism, there is room for free thought. You can live without being at the top of the capitalist pyramid. Sure, the people at the top are corrupt, but guess why? They have power! Money=power!
Personally, I think capitalism can become more fair. Capitalism itself has absolutely nothing to do with a corruption of those in power. Capitalism is, and I quote from the Google result, “an economic and political system in which a country’s trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.” Where does it say the owners of the business have to care nothing for their consumers/workers? Nowhere? Exactly! Of course it means that now. I’m not a moron, capitalism is corrupt, but there’s nothing inherently corrupt about what capitalism is by definition. It may lead to that, though. Big corporations are definitely corrupt. Small businesses, however, have a smaller percentage of that happening. Yet, they’re still in a capitalist system, are they not?
Also, where is the competition for more customers/better products in communism? Monopolies are illegal for that exact reason. If everything is controlled by everyone, or by a central power, where is the need for better products? Where is the competition? To an extent, of course, competition is bad, but you can’t tell me competition hasn’t caused a lot of new innovations. Patents also lead to innovations.
Quite honestly, until someone can tell me how communism would work large scale, how you would prevent power from corrupting, and basically, in excruciating detail, how it would work, I’m going to have to oppose it. I oppose capitalism, too, but at least I understand how it functions and prevents bad shit from going down in countries that use it.
(Oh, and also, if you can show me a country that has communism and didn’t fail to get there and end up with a totalitarian government, I’d be happy to listen.)
(I also just don’t really like communism as an idea, to be frank. It seems to close to becoming a dystopia for my taste.)
Anarcho communism is cool and stuff but you do realize that human nature wouldn’t allow for it to work, right? Humans are selfish. They will try to take power.
citation needed
Emma Goldman just rolled her eyes in her grave.
And wild bears break into houses because they’re looking for a tricycle to ride.
What does that have to do with anything?
Bears in captivity ride tricycles so it’s obviously “ursine nature” to behave that way.
I’m not really sure how animal abuse in captivity is relevant to the selfish nature of humans.
And anarchism would turn into a world of what is now considered crime. Look at what people do with laws, and imagine what they would do without them. Look at the book Animal Farm, for example. Even The Lorax works as an argument. Animal Farm was originally written as satire for Stalinist Russia. However, it has grounds in society today. Why does the US have “checks and balances” to keep one branch of government from becoming too powerful? BECAUSE HUMANS WILL TRY TO TAKE POWER IF GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY, AND IT CORRUPTS. In Animal Farm, the pigs took power because they were the smartest. They originally were (at least supposedly) there to help the other animals. However, as time went on, since the other animals weren’t smart enough to notice or fight back, the pigs started to take advantage of them. Sure, they were animals in the book, but they were personified animals. They were showing what humans would do in that situation.
Now, I know that’s Stalinist communism, not Marxism. I think communism is a beautiful idea, but I don’t think that it is possible to totally implement it in a way that would work. I don’t think humans can’t be taught. Our current way of life is too far ingrained into us, and by the time we got it learned, I find it hard to believe that the group teaching us wouldn’t have taken power.
I’m not saying I don’t like communism, I just don’t think it can be implemented properly given how ingrained in our current lifestyle we are without it backfiring somehow.
(Also if capitalism has been around longer than communism I think that it would be our nature not just conditioning)
These people.
Every time.
Without fail.
That nearly everyone is forced to read fairy tales about the dangers of inferiors unseating the status quo at some point sometime in school has absolutely nothing to do with the benefits the propertied class receive from mass political powerlessness. No way. Just ridiculous.
Animal Farm is about how bad Stalinist Russia is and the lesson is “ultimate power corrupts ultimately”. I don’t get what you’re saying. I don’t get what’s confusing about how the pigs tried to implement communism but instead created an oligarchy. Also, yet again, could somebody explain to me or give me sources as to how actual communism of any form would be implemented successfully? Because yes, it is better than capitalism.
Except it’s not, it’s an allegorical work of fiction. If it actually were about how bad Soviet Russia was supposed to be, it would concern itself with facts as many anti-communist historians have tried and failed in the face of evidence against their claims. If Orwell really wanted to write a book alleging the “badness” of the Soviet Union in the Stalin era, he would have done his research on the subject, but like any good liberal, he realized this was impossible, as reality often displays a frightening equivocation of such a Manichaen dichotomy. So like any liberal idealist, he portrayed this “badness” as spiritual or imaginary through fiction.
Any implied parallel between Animal Farm and the Soviet Union(or reality in general) exists in your imagination. I invite you to research the reality of the Soviet Union instead of allowing yourself to be intimidated by works of fiction.
Animal Farm is not an especially technically proficient piece of writing, nor is it a sophisticated satire. It was just expedient to the interests of imperialist power to diffuse this story as widely as possible and draw it’s connection to the Soviet Union. The CIA even funded the animated adaptation. The story itself is so vague that it could just as easily be applied to the French Revolution or the Hoxhaist conception of Khrushchev.
There is nothing wrong with writing fairy stories, but it’s patently false to make reference to them to make a political point about a historical incidence. Tthere were innumerable satires about the capitalist countries written in the Soviet Union in the Stalin era. Why are these irrelevant to your understanding while Animal Farm is? Their claim to correspond to reality is as strong as Animal Farm.
It’s not confusing at all how Orwell dehumanizes the working class. He was a worthless person like that. He couldn’t bring any facts out or study the facts of Soviet Russia’s political system, so like any good coward, he made up fiction and lies that continue to be trite cautions which are repeated by reactionary demagogues every time the working class demands the slightest concession.
If you are dealing with historical truth, you owe works of fiction nothing.
Most of what you know about the Soviet Union comes from anti-communist historiography produced by Imperialist powers during the Cold War. I’m not going to accuse you of being brainwashed, I will simply point out that you, like myself have been lied to about the Soviet Union by those who’s vested interest is to oppose (and slander) any attempt by the working people to repress their enemies. politically. For a long time I believed these lies uncritically until I decided to investigate these claims individually
With regard to your last point, Communism is not theoretical, it is the result of the scientific application of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism defined as the end of the bourgeoisie as a class and and their corresponding legal form (private property).
Communism is implemented successfully by a form of organization which is able to repress the bourgeoisie by carrying class struggles by the masses to a new level. This interferes with their legal ability for capital to function reliably for them.
In order to understand this science correctly you do not need the read anything, it has been carried out successfully by illiterate peasants. If reading is conducive to your understanding I reccomend the following introduction:
I can’t refute or agree with what you’re saying since I have no understanding of Animal Farm outside of my English class and what you just said. But my understanding is that Orwell wrote it that way because he would’ve been killed otherwise and it’s basically a direct parallel to the Soviet Union since he wasn’t a real clever shit. But if at all possible, could you give me sources? I’m not really inclined to believe either way since I don’t have much reason to without more to back it up. I love finding ways that the popular mentality is brainwashed and propaganda, so even if what you’re saying is wrong I’ll probably believe you. If you give me sources. I’m not going to trust some random person off the internet without more to back them up. Basic CARS Checklist, really. And I mean we can’t really say with certainty what Orwell was trying to do unless he wrote it down or is still alive to tell us. (As opposed to analysis of Of Mice And Men, which from my understanding comes from how he planned it. I haven’t seen it myself, though.) And both sides in the Cold War used a lot of propaganda, just saying. Propaganda, as I’m sure you’re aware, is really powerful during wars.
Reading and sources is how I know it didn’t come out of your ass, and is how I learn things better, since I’m not an illiterate peasant.
I understand how Marxism is better than what I’ve been told happened in Russia. I like communism but it hasn’t successfully been done yet to my understanding.
I will read that, though.
.Orwell intended it as directly parallel to the Soviet Union, as such it is a popularization of the distorted and false Trotskyist belief that capitalist restoration occurred in the Stalin era. I am aware of Orwell’s intent. It was simply his intent to popularize a lie about the Soviet Union. It is parallel to Orwell’s conception of the Soviet Union and not the Soviet Union itself.
If he imagined he would be killed for using the names of the figures he intended to portray, that’s his business. I think that’s self-flattery because of the volume of anti-communist literature. With fiction, conveniently, it is possible to do away with all obligation to fact.
So, are you sincerely asking me for a source on wither or not Animal Farm is a work of fiction? If you can’t even agree to that, then you maintain the historical incidence of talking pigs.
Animal Farm expresses that the lies about the Soviet Union could continue nowhere else but in outright fiction.
That is all I am saying. It doesn’t matter wither or not you agree because it’s trueregardless of what Orwell’s intent was. .
Animal Farm is a work of Fiction with as much bearing on the fact of the Soviet Union as anything written by Chuck Tingle.
But if you want sources about my factual claim that it was funded by the CIA, you could have just googled it instead of me waste my time finding it for you.. It’s fewer keystrokes than pointlessly meandering and repeating yourself to flesh out a non-response, and since you didn’t even ask me which factual claim you wanted a citation for, it’s calculatedly vague and confusing.
Since you claim to like reading and sources and finding out perceived inconsistencies in the popular understanding, I think a good place to start is the widespread notion that Stalin and Mao (among others) were tyrannical despots and the associated conspiracy theories that they manufactured the deaths of millions. Then you’re in for a treat.
What exactly am I supposed to “mind” when you say ‘propaganda”. Propaganda is a word for information or communications with negative connotations. There is nothing wrong with information in and of itself. It is wither that information is true or false is what matters. Propaganda can express true statements and false ones like any form of information, aside from that it’s an intimidating word. All (not both) sides in the Cold War used Propaganda. In the case of the Soviet Union and China, it was mostly right, as it was centered on attacking the US for their repeated wars and support for genocidaires. The Anti-Communist Propaganda produced by the US and their allies focused on Communism allegedly infringing upon “liberty”, which had no meaning for outside contradictory and propertarian grounds.
Communism isn’t something which is ‘done’ successfully. It’s the result of successful class struggle. It cannot be declared or implemented by anyone except the masses participating in active repression of the bourgeoisie and effective a qualificative change in the basis for the legal forms of society.When we say we are communists, we do not express our intention to term anything or practice as communism but that we will not stop fighting until the day when last bourgeoisie is no longer protected.
I don’t know where you got the idea that I was confused as to whether or not Animal Farm was fiction. I’m not stupid or below five years old. Animals don’t talk.
I’ve tried googling stuff related to this and I never really get what I’m looking for.
Sources on whether or not what you’re saying about the Soviet Union is true. And am I wrong in that Russia didn’t do communism correctly and it ended up not working? Somebody I was having a similar conversation with said that, and I can’t remember their URL currently but if you really want it… They said that we could learn from the mistakes of Spain and Russia.
I’ll look at it but didn’t Stalin kill more than Hitler or is that just my English teacher making up shit?
Whatever. All. It’s really besides my point. I get what you’re saying.
Okay, I get it. Although since it’s a process I consider it implementing an ideology.
Anarcho communism is cool and stuff but you do realize that human nature wouldn’t allow for it to work, right? Humans are selfish. They will try to take power.
citation needed
Emma Goldman just rolled her eyes in her grave.
And wild bears break into houses because they’re looking for a tricycle to ride.
What does that have to do with anything?
Bears in captivity ride tricycles so it’s obviously “ursine nature” to behave that way.
I’m not really sure how animal abuse in captivity is relevant to the selfish nature of humans.
And anarchism would turn into a world of what is now considered crime. Look at what people do with laws, and imagine what they would do without them. Look at the book Animal Farm, for example. Even The Lorax works as an argument. Animal Farm was originally written as satire for Stalinist Russia. However, it has grounds in society today. Why does the US have “checks and balances” to keep one branch of government from becoming too powerful? BECAUSE HUMANS WILL TRY TO TAKE POWER IF GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY, AND IT CORRUPTS. In Animal Farm, the pigs took power because they were the smartest. They originally were (at least supposedly) there to help the other animals. However, as time went on, since the other animals weren’t smart enough to notice or fight back, the pigs started to take advantage of them. Sure, they were animals in the book, but they were personified animals. They were showing what humans would do in that situation.
Now, I know that’s Stalinist communism, not Marxism. I think communism is a beautiful idea, but I don’t think that it is possible to totally implement it in a way that would work. I don’t think humans can’t be taught. Our current way of life is too far ingrained into us, and by the time we got it learned, I find it hard to believe that the group teaching us wouldn’t have taken power.
I’m not saying I don’t like communism, I just don’t think it can be implemented properly given how ingrained in our current lifestyle we are without it backfiring somehow.
(Also if capitalism has been around longer than communism I think that it would be our nature not just conditioning)
The point I am making is that humans, like all animals, adapt to the circumstances and conditions of their environment. The economic/social environment that we currently live in conditions us to act selfishly, much as so many captive bears have been trained to behave in a way they wouldn’t outside of that similarly coercive environment. The only provable characteristic of human nature is to adapt to our surroundings.
As for the study you cite, it proves that the subjects’ previous training from society still held sway over their choices in the game. Would the outcome have been the same if they had been raised in a gift economy, such as was the norm for many, many human cultures for the majority of history? I highly doubt it.
Edited to add that I somehow completely missed the final, utterly ignorant assertion that capitalism is older than communism.
Right, I get that. I understand that it is ingrained into humans through conditioning. I’m just not sure how you’d change that since most people are used to capitalism.
Right, their PREVIOUS TRAINING FROM SOCIETY. How would you override that for the superior (admittedly) idea of anarchist communism?
I said if, I don’t know. Is it not?
And please, I want sources.
(I have to take something to my son at his job sort of soon so this won’t be as thorough a reply as I’d like. I can be pretty bad at coming back to things if I don’t immediately address them, though.)
I believe it starts with building alternative relationships within our immediate communities. It starts with learning what much of life was like before commonly held land was stolen by the state and turned into the private property of the predecessors of today’s capitalists. It’s not going to be an immediate transition, of course. The invention of capitalism took a while and growing out of it will, too. As an old Sergeant Major once told me during an especially tedious training exercise, “You don’t eat the whole horse in one bite, son. Start with his nose and gnaw your way to his ass.”
Building a culture that values sharing and de-emphasizes consumption as status-seeking will take a lot of different and varied approaches. Diversity of tactics applies in the social aspects of the process of revolution just as much as it does in direct clashes in the streets. Things like neighborhood “tool libraries” where infrequently used tools like lawnmowers, hedgers, shovels, etc. are shared, backyard-sharing garden clubs (and canning clubs) where people with growing space to spare share it with others who don’t have as much, and other forms of cooperative living aren’t the full solution, of course, but they can begin to build a foundation. (I’m not talking about trying to bring back the good old days of slit-trench shitters, cholera, and burying grandpa at the ripe old age of 40, though. I also don’t pretend that backyard gardens are enough to feed humanity. These are simply tools to change the way we relate to one another.)
I dashed off a first-thought, half-assed, but better explanation for this foundation building elsewhere. One of these days I might get around to fleshing it out in more depth but here it is, as it is. I’m past the halfway point in life for men in my family, though, so I know I won’t live to see more than seeds and saplings being planted. I’m content to be one of those “old men who plant trees whose shade they’ll never nap in.”
Okay, I get the little things. But eventually we’ll have to “attack” big corporations, won’t we? How do we go about replacing those with a more equal (fair, whatever) systems? Do we just eventually run them out of business? What? Also, what about clothes? I can imagine there’d probably be some sort of system to pass it down, would there not? I’m really confused with that part of it. It’s just hard to wrap my head around, but I am trying and I’m using the internet to learn.
And I’m not saying it’s likely, but somebody has to initiate this, right? How is it completely impossible for them to end up taking advantage of it? I’m not saying it’s likely, I just want to know how we’d assure this. (Maybe I’m just being ignorant here, though.)
The questions you’re asking don’t really have answers because we haven’t reached the point in time/conditions when there are answers to them. We can only make plans and act based on observing current conditions and past events. At best we can only do our best to make conditions as favorable as we can for the people who will be shaping that phase of the revolutionary process when those answers arrive.
We know what feeds capitalism and the state. (Alienation, consumption, isolation, artificial scarcity, etc.) We can take action to counter those and weaken them. We know what nurtures and sustains a successful insurgency. (Popular support of the masses, de-legitimization of existing power dynamics, mutual aid and solidarity, etc.) We can take action to build and strengthen them.
We won’t know the answers to those questions. To be honest I don’t think my sons will, either. Some day somebody will, though, and we owe it to them to make sure they have the tools necessary to see those answers become the solutions humanity needs.
That’s just my take, though. I’m not an anarchist for myself, except perhaps as a way to atone for things I’ve done and abetted that have harmed humanity. I’m in this because there are things more important than my fleeting, ultimately to-be-forgotten, existence.
Then I feel like there might be a problem if we don’t really know what we’re doing, wouldn’t there? I guess we wouldn’t reach the point where those answers would be necessary until we know the answers to those questions, will we? I guess I’m not the only one confused by this.
If we can start making efforts towards weakening capitalism’s hold, though, we would definitely be making progress towards the answers and reaching the ultimate goal here. Right? (I’m so used to it, saying “weakening capitalism” feels weird.)
Anarcho communism is cool and stuff but you do realize that human nature wouldn’t allow for it to work, right? Humans are selfish. They will try to take power.
Do you realize that the argument of “selfish human nature” is crap?
If that were true we would never have survived as a specie. Caveman would have never shared fire, food, knowledge and so on.
Selfish as a species, then. Look at how little concern (capitalism at least) has for other species.
Also, if you read all my other reblogs of this post, you’d see that I had backed off that argument and that I’m now trying to fully understand how it would work.
“Capitalists” are the ones who donnot care about other species. Capitalism is just a theory.
Honestly didnt read all other reblogs. If you are interested in learning how would it work investigate about EZLN, paris comune, anrchism in spain and some other things i can remember.
And Please stay away from “anarcocapitalism” thta shit is not anarchism.
Exactly. Because they are selfish. Selfishness of businesses is why it’s so damn hard to get them to give one fuck about the environment. How is capitalism a theory if it is a common form of government?
It would be a good bit ridiculous to expect you to read all those walls of text, honestly. I am definitely trying and will look into those.
Trust me, I just read something about it, I have no interest in it as a concept at all. It’s an oxymoron to be frank and quite honest.
Capitalism is a theory just like socialism, communism and anarchism. The thing is that is widely used around the world, not as “form of government” since capitalists are the ones who really decide what to do , they are the bosses of presidents and then call it “democracy”. (I am not talking about conspiracy or illuminati crap)
I would not call them selfish, they are greedy heartless pieces of shit that only care about having more money and power to keep them as the ruling class.
P.S. I love the word oxymoron.
Okay, then. I guess I just have to take your word for that since it doesn’t make much difference to me. It’s not “direct democracy”, and I don’t see anyone claiming that it is, but it’s democracy in a sense.
Yeah, isn’t that what selfishness is? Only caring about yourself and your advancement at the expense of others is selfishness, is it not? I definitely see how capitalism is problematic.
I mean really, capitalism and anarchism have no place together.
Anarcho communism is cool and stuff but you do realize that human nature wouldn’t allow for it to work, right? Humans are selfish. They will try to take power.
citation needed
Emma Goldman just rolled her eyes in her grave.
And wild bears break into houses because they’re looking for a tricycle to ride.
What does that have to do with anything?
Bears in captivity ride tricycles so it’s obviously “ursine nature” to behave that way.
I’m not really sure how animal abuse in captivity is relevant to the selfish nature of humans.
And anarchism would turn into a world of what is now considered crime. Look at what people do with laws, and imagine what they would do without them. Look at the book Animal Farm, for example. Even The Lorax works as an argument. Animal Farm was originally written as satire for Stalinist Russia. However, it has grounds in society today. Why does the US have “checks and balances” to keep one branch of government from becoming too powerful? BECAUSE HUMANS WILL TRY TO TAKE POWER IF GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY, AND IT CORRUPTS. In Animal Farm, the pigs took power because they were the smartest. They originally were (at least supposedly) there to help the other animals. However, as time went on, since the other animals weren’t smart enough to notice or fight back, the pigs started to take advantage of them. Sure, they were animals in the book, but they were personified animals. They were showing what humans would do in that situation.
Now, I know that’s Stalinist communism, not Marxism. I think communism is a beautiful idea, but I don’t think that it is possible to totally implement it in a way that would work. I don’t think humans can’t be taught. Our current way of life is too far ingrained into us, and by the time we got it learned, I find it hard to believe that the group teaching us wouldn’t have taken power.
I’m not saying I don’t like communism, I just don’t think it can be implemented properly given how ingrained in our current lifestyle we are without it backfiring somehow.
(Also if capitalism has been around longer than communism I think that it would be our nature not just conditioning)
These people.
Every time.
Without fail.
That nearly everyone is forced to read fairy tales about the dangers of inferiors unseating the status quo at some point sometime in school has absolutely nothing to do with the benefits the propertied class receive from mass political powerlessness. No way. Just ridiculous.
Animal Farm is about how bad Stalinist Russia is and the lesson is “ultimate power corrupts ultimately”. I don’t get what you’re saying. I don’t get what’s confusing about how the pigs tried to implement communism but instead created an oligarchy. Also, yet again, could somebody explain to me or give me sources as to how actual communism of any form would be implemented successfully? Because yes, it is better than capitalism.
Except it’s not, it’s an allegorical work of fiction. If it actually were about how bad Soviet Russia was supposed to be, it would concern itself with facts as many anti-communist historians have tried and failed in the face of evidence against their claims. If Orwell really wanted to write a book alleging the “badness” of the Soviet Union in the Stalin era, he would have done his research on the subject, but like any good liberal, he realized this was impossible, as reality often displays a frightening equivocation of such a Manichaen dichotomy. So like any liberal idealist, he portrayed this “badness” as spiritual or imaginary through fiction.
Any implied parallel between Animal Farm and the Soviet Union(or reality in general) exists in your imagination. I invite you to research the reality of the Soviet Union instead of allowing yourself to be intimidated by works of fiction.
Animal Farm is not an especially technically proficient piece of writing, nor is it a sophisticated satire. It was just expedient to the interests of imperialist power to diffuse this story as widely as possible and draw it’s connection to the Soviet Union. The CIA even funded the animated adaptation. The story itself is so vague that it could just as easily be applied to the French Revolution or the Hoxhaist conception of Khrushchev.
There is nothing wrong with writing fairy stories, but it’s patently false to make reference to them to make a political point about a historical incidence. Tthere were innumerable satires about the capitalist countries written in the Soviet Union in the Stalin era. Why are these irrelevant to your understanding while Animal Farm is? Their claim to correspond to reality is as strong as Animal Farm.
It’s not confusing at all how Orwell dehumanizes the working class. He was a worthless person like that. He couldn’t bring any facts out or study the facts of Soviet Russia’s political system, so like any good coward, he made up fiction and lies that continue to be trite cautions which are repeated by reactionary demagogues every time the working class demands the slightest concession.
If you are dealing with historical truth, you owe works of fiction nothing.
Most of what you know about the Soviet Union comes from anti-communist historiography produced by Imperialist powers during the Cold War. I’m not going to accuse you of being brainwashed, I will simply point out that you, like myself have been lied to about the Soviet Union by those who’s vested interest is to oppose (and slander) any attempt by the working people to repress their enemies. politically. For a long time I believed these lies uncritically until I decided to investigate these claims individually
With regard to your last point, Communism is not theoretical, it is the result of the scientific application of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism defined as the end of the bourgeoisie as a class and and their corresponding legal form (private property).
Communism is implemented successfully by a form of organization which is able to repress the bourgeoisie by carrying class struggles by the masses to a new level. This interferes with their legal ability for capital to function reliably for them.
In order to understand this science correctly you do not need the read anything, it has been carried out successfully by illiterate peasants. If reading is conducive to your understanding I reccomend the following introduction:
I can’t refute or agree with what you’re saying since I have no understanding of Animal Farm outside of my English class and what you just said. But my understanding is that Orwell wrote it that way because he would’ve been killed otherwise and it’s basically a direct parallel to the Soviet Union since he wasn’t a real clever shit. But if at all possible, could you give me sources? I’m not really inclined to believe either way since I don’t have much reason to without more to back it up. I love finding ways that the popular mentality is brainwashed and propaganda, so even if what you’re saying is wrong I’ll probably believe you. If you give me sources. I’m not going to trust some random person off the internet without more to back them up. Basic CARS Checklist, really. And I mean we can’t really say with certainty what Orwell was trying to do unless he wrote it down or is still alive to tell us. (As opposed to analysis of Of Mice And Men, which from my understanding comes from how he planned it. I haven’t seen it myself, though.) And both sides in the Cold War used a lot of propaganda, just saying. Propaganda, as I’m sure you’re aware, is really powerful during wars.
Reading and sources is how I know it didn’t come out of your ass, and is how I learn things better, since I’m not an illiterate peasant.
I understand how Marxism is better than what I’ve been told happened in Russia. I like communism but it hasn’t successfully been done yet to my understanding.
Anarcho communism is cool and stuff but you do realize that human nature wouldn’t allow for it to work, right? Humans are selfish. They will try to take power.
The whole point of anarcho-communism is to eliminate the means by which individuals might successfully seize power over others. If you live in a completely non-hierarchically organized society in which everyone has autonomy, everyone has an equal voice in policy-making, and everyone’s needs are met, then good luck convincing enough people to submit to your authority to form any force capable of overpowering the rest of society.
In implementing it somebody would take power since it’s so far from what everyone is used to and, admittedly, conditioned to do.
Also, that’s like the definition of utopia, which is impossible for humans to achieve.
That’s why it is necessary for the great majority of working people to become educated and, to use your terminology, re-condition themselves, so as to achieve the level of class consciousness and mass organization necessary to carry out an anarcho-communist revolution successfully and fend off counter-revolution.
The definition of utopia is a place where everything is perfect. No serious communist or anarchist would claim that the society they envision would be lacking any flaws or problems at all in everyday life. We do, however, believe that abolishing private property would lead to a vast improvement in the quality of life for just about everyone, and would eliminate much of the great strife and suffering inherent in the capitalist system, just as abolishing slavery and feudalism has eliminated much of the strife and suffering inherent in life under those systems. We are utopians only in the sense that we believe a better society is possible, not that we believe in a literally perfect one.
“Every daring attempt to make a great change in existing conditions, every lofty vision of new possibilities for the human race, has been labeled Utopian.” –Emma Goldman
Hmm, yeah, I guess. It would be better. I get it. It would take effort, but I definitely now see how it’s possible. Flaws or not, it’s better than how corrupt capitalism is.
ifesbob 