It’s a thing that has started to appear because of mainstream social media deleting post with “bad vibes”. Kill, suicide, and such vocabulary are actively repressed to “ensure happiness”
That makes sense. Avoiding censorship is reasonable. I was thinking some people did it to avoid triggers, as if seeing 'rpe' or 'kll' isn't the exact same thing as seeing the words spelled out.
Yea YouTube and TikToks automated demonetization is definitely a big part to blame for this stupid trend. It also annoys me as an enjoyer of YouTube murder porn.
It’s especially dumb because there is some extremely heinous stuff on YouTube that is still monetized, and when a video is demonetized for a channel they still play ads all over it, too.
Yeah they don’t like when people talk about mental health issues. Go kill yourself in private and stop getting your bad vibes all over my nice, clean website.
The idea of “soulmates” or “the one and only” is inherently dangerous because it threatens the honesty of a relationship at a fundamental level. And what’s more important to a relationship than honesty?
Oh absolutely. My wife is literally the closest thing there could be to a soulmate. That being said, we both know that there are billions of other people in the world. There’s always an option to find someone else, so we always treat each other right.
Right? Any relationship takes work to maintain, so expecting things to just magically work without putting in any effort is a recipe for disappointment.
Also, the whole opposites attract thing is kinda bullshit when you look at 40+ year marriages.
I think opposites and sames are bad frames to think of sex and relationships. Aggro top and meek bottom are either a recipe for a wonderful night or a terrible one depending on communication and tastes. Likewise I’ve had good sex with fellow bottoms even though it might’ve been better had she been a top. Additionally a generous vers will find no better company than another generous vers. What works best is one’s complement.
Communication is critical but it’s kind of related to honesty. You can definitely imagine a relationship where there is honesty but not enough communication or there is honesty but there is miscommunication without the issue ever being addressed.
Yeah, I was rubbing my face holes in there like a man possessed. Getting everything properly under my eyelids. There was thorough eyeball to anus contact. In my defence, it was amazing.
Wait wait you are telling me Musk didn’t pull himself by his boots straps and actually is the biggest welfare queen there is? Nooo, I can’t believe it…
I don’t get this argument. The US government has invested into a tech development. Which means that spacex seemed to have a good base to pull that off. I didn’t see a line of other companies doing anywhere near that capability.
Also, everyone calls for government to take lead in doing stuff for the betterment of humanity, but the second that happened, everyone loses their minds. Make up your mind, are we ok with government doing stuff or not?
Well, you seem to think the public is a monolith and not a bunch of squabbling tribes.
The people who understand shit want progress and understand the government (when not held back) can make wonderful things happen.
Then you have the people who can’t see benefit for anything past the end of their nose arguing to turn the clocks back to 1922 because grandpappy said it was better.
Yeah, government subsidies literally exist to try and get people to do the thing they’re subsidizing - it makes no sense to hate on a company that completes them.
It makes sense when the company basically exploded on the scene with impossible claims which then turned out to be (obviously) lies. SpaceX always claimed to make rockets 10 times cheaper due to reuse. This wasn’t possible, isn’t possible, and won’t be possible due to how rockets work. Yet here we are, the US is paying SpaceX normal and expected prices while they keep claiming impossible bullshit
Subsidies work by the government setting a series of conditions which must be met, those conditions were met. NASA recently did a report about work with spaceX and said it had proven great value for money, the US military have said the same.
Elon is a trash tier person but he’s basically just the company clown, all the stuff they’re doing is highly skilled people and they’re doing it incredibly well.
I don’t have an issue with governments outsourcing “space Works” to other companies. It’s a necessary thing I think.
However, SpaceX (from Elon “I’m a scammer, baby” Musk) which arguably is the most successful amongst the companies from Musk, has… issues.
The basic premise behind the reusable rockets was that they would be 10 times cheaper! Yeah and then reality hits and space x rockets are just about the same cost because of how rockets work.
See, rocketry is basically transportation, just like a trailer truck transporting goods. You always have the vehicle, the fuel, and the material you transport.
With a trailer truck, you don’t need a lot of gas to go very far. This means you have a lot of weight for both the vehicle and thebcargo. So the truck itself can be made very sturdy and you still transport a lot of cargo. Trucks can go for thousands of miles with no or light maintenance and can last very long.
Now take an airplane. Airplanes need more fuel and need to be lighter for flight so you need to use lighter materials. Lighter materials equate more maintenance, more risks of breakage, more work to keep them going. Transportation with airplanes consequently is much more expensive.
Rocketry is at the very edge of what can be done with all known Materials. A rocket typically is about 5% cargo, 10% rocket, and 85% fuel. This is what is needed to get any rocket into orbit. I’d you want to get beyond Low Earth Orbit you might need multiple stages. All this needs to be as light as possible while at the same time as controlled violent as possible to get you there. Rocket engines basically need to pump insame amounts of fuel uit to get a exhaust flow rate that is high enough.
Because of this engines have an enormous wear and tear whist at the same time being as light as possible. Remember the truck engine where it really matters little if you add a few kilos more or less? For rockets, each kilo matters. So rocket engines are extremely fragile in comparison whilst at the same time plowing though factors more power in just minutes.
So Elon comes with the idea of reusing rockets. Cool. Contrary to what he always claims, this his was not a new idea, this was not his idea. (None of his ideas are his, nor new, nor great). This was done in the 80s-90s by NASA and the conclusion was that the cost and waste of returning and reusable rockets typically is the same or more than simply dumping them.
Funny detail: look at DARPA tests where everything is done right and people applaud the safe conclusion of tests vs. SpaceX where people always applaud when rockets explode. It’s weird!
So now look at what SpaceX charges for their reusable advertised as 10 times cheaper rockets and… they cost about the same as other rockets.
Then look at fucking musk. That last rocket they sent up didn’t have flame diverters at the launch Facility because Elon decided it wasn’t needed. Before launch, people who know rocket launches all wondered “eeeehhh WTF are we doing here?” and the launch destroyed ,(obliterated is a better word) the launch facility and heavily polluted the entire area and adjacent ocean. A car parking lot 5 miles away had all cars pelted with debris, it was a fucking disaster.
In conclusion: I guess the main problem I have with SpaceX is Elon Musk. The guy is like trump in that he lies through his teeth with every word he utters. He always comes up with just plain stupid and impossible ideas (let’s daily transport people with ballistic rockets!) and people lap it up thinking he’s a genius. He’s an idiot. And he’s in charge of SpaceX. SpaceX regularly lies about the costs which is a problem. SpaceX does stupid shit because of Musk, which is a problem.
I’m sure there are some very good and intelligent engineers working at SpaceX but I feel their voices and decisions are overrun by the CEO, Musk, making the company a bad thing.
Man that is not the point here.. The point is that your uni now can send stuff to orbit when 10 years ago it was economically prohibitted. Elon can fuck off but spacex IMO is a net positive to humanity.
Yeah better go back to the caves where there were no plastic, right?
Edit: I’m all for sending stuff out in space in a responsible manner, just got bored about lots of people being anti tech here. Probably answered the wrong person, sorry!
BTW isn’t most stuff in low orbit falling out down in the atmosphere or is that just not enough to chean it up?
You realise that littering close orbit with more shit is just going to turn it into a whirling extraterrestrial claymore for anything trying to leave the planet.
Everything that goes up there should have a lifespan to come back down.
Yup, low earth orbit (LEO) still has some thin atmosphere that slows things down a tiny bit and makes them deorbit over time. That’s why, for example, the ISS has to reboost to stay up and can chuck garbage bags overboard and not really worry about them. The deorbit time depends on a lot of factors including the mass and surface area. Starlink sats are supposed to passively deorbit in about 5 years.
Satellites are why everyone in Africa has a mobile phone and they didn’t have to build huge infrastructure projects to connect everyone, billions of the poorest people in the would have cheap access because of satalites which gives them access to education, healthcare information, tools to politically organise and all sorts of other benefits.
GPS is a service we all use regularly from the richest to poorest, hugely advanced and totally free to use - it’s a literal lifesaver
Another literal lifesaver that’s free for everyone to benefit from is whether satalites, when people get warned of incoming hurricanes and typhoons that’s satalites.
The various global warming research satalites could also save our lives, and the lives of everyone in the planet.
And the things we have planned in space will help avoid resource depletion and allow development of far higher standards of life for everyone, mining titanium for example could make this incredibly useful metal as cheap as steel which would totally revolutionise things like water treatment and construction.
Yes musk is an idiot but that doesn’t mean satalites aren’t awesome
I forgot how ignorant and self-righteous Reddit liberals were. The ones I’ve seen are easily the loudest and dumbest people on this network of federated instances. They have their “conviction” and “is wrong” sliders completely maxed out.
Since you can’t see the irony in your initial comment, let me spell it out for you in a way you might be able to understand:
You drone on about maxed convictions while being wrong. But, you’re literally doing the same thing that you whine pointlessly about: your original comment is nothing but a shitty, baseless generalized opinion about a large group of people, with zero substance.
Thank you so much for showing me that not every liberal I meet here will be ignorant and self-righteous. I can no longer say that has been the totality of my experience with them. I now have hope that my next encounter will be just as positive as this one was.
Look, you started hot in this thread but tired after a few comments. They adjusted, you didn’t, and you got rocked; it happens. Hit the showers and we’ll get after it early tomorrow with some film.
A guy named “420blazeit69”, who is clearly some kind of shitty LLM wielding troll farmer from his comment history, told me I got rocked. Guess I better call it a day!
Hey! Do me a favor since you’re sitting next to 420blazeit69 at the troll farm. Tell him you guys better start winning some of these online arguments or else you’re both going back to live in the shitty commie blocks, drinking nasty ass potato vodka all day!
Instead of (poorly) attempting to sow discord in a place you will never visit, amongst people you will never meet, don’t you guys have an inkling of desire to do something, you know, productive and upward with your life? I’m sure there has to be a better option in your society than grinding it out in a shitty troll farm.
i’m sure there has to be a better option in your society than grinding it out in a shitty troll farm.
Sadly, no. Here in the United States of America, there is no opportunity for those outside the ruling class. Hence I spend my days posting away in hexbear.net’s volunteer troll farm.
I mean, I have pity for you having to sit on here and be sour and awful all day long. So I guess I have some of my humanity left? As for you, maybe you should try to find something more positive and upwards in life instead of trying to derail a bunch of people on the other side of the planet.
Literally the most upvoted comment on the whole post is about shitty troll farm bots like you. Apparently you guys are having a hard time “blending in” 🤣
Oh man can you imagine modern commie blocks with modern materials being built in cities instead the same dogshit five over ones? Owning a commie block with your commie neighbors, getting together and deciding to paint whatever, or knock some walls out and make an indoor community garden…
Once you troll farmers start to lose control of the arguments, you always end up here in THEEIR RacIST, SEXiST HOMOpHobEs because you know you can’t keep up the focus on the subject.
I love that you dumb ass troll farmers have nothing to do all day but bicker in your little self-made echo chambers. Enjoy the fruits of your (pointless) endeavors!
Do you think a troll farm would really spend that much time talking to itself? Are you so arrogant that you believe they’d do that level of kabuki theater in order to impress you?
Sorry your government (most likely Russia or China) is so shitty they have to pay you to (poorly) convince the rest of the world that they are even close to being as awful as them. I said nothing about any one’s race, but you’re doing great at redirecting.
It’s not my government, and neither is Russia, but you aren’t fooling anyone by disparaging someone by identifying them as living in China (or Russia, since the EU recently decided again that it’s Not White Enough).
I didn’t disparage anyone for living anywhere! You fucks keep putting words in my mouth. I’m disparaging shitty troll farmers for getting paid by their shitty governments for trying to derail shit everywhere else in the world. Rub your two neurons together and maybe you can comprehend what I keep saying over and over again in other posts.
Your comments elsewhere say the quiet part a little louder, like the bit about “potato vodka”. Do you think I’ve never seen a motte-and-bailey argument before? It’s clear what you mean when you use a term like “second world” as a pejorative.
I mean, America is also majority white. If you made quips about curry when discussing someone that you allege to be stationed in India, I think you can tell that that would be called racist. Same if you talked about a Chinese national eating rice noodles or dumplings or take your pick. You are adding in elements of racial coding that are unnecessary and it doesn’t look like an accident.
Your lack of social understanding is showing through. Maybe if you lived in any of the countries you disparage all day long (or just did something useful and constructive with your life besides troll farming), you might understand that “dude” is gender neutral these days. But sure, I’m sorry if my usage of “dude” really exacted a heavy load of social injustice upon you.
Go fucking fuck yourself you fucking piece of shit. Talking about other people’s sOcIaL uNdeRsTandIng while you’re fucking misgendering people AND JUSTIFYING IT AS IF YOU’RE A FUCKING VICTIM once you’re called on it. You’re rancid scum and I hope we get fucking defederated so we don’t have to deal with filth like you.
Do you go around telling other people that you fuck dudes? What do other people assume you mean when you say that you fuck dudes?
You could have just been like “Yeah you’re right, sorry.” but instead you doubled down on being a transphobic dickhead and literally proved my point about liberals being shitbags.
No, it wouldn’t be a problem if he said he fucked dudes. The implication though is that “dudes” is a gendered term. The complaint is that she was misgendered by someone who then doubled down on the misgendering. Her statement was not homophobic.
In my experience, sexual inferences are the fastest way to educate someone who doesn’t see a word as being gendered, but I can see how what they said could be read as using gay sexual activity in a negative way to someone not reading this thread and skimmed over the rest of the text in that reply.
Playing dumb is used by bigots as a shield to continue their bigotry unimpeded. Not allowing any room for them to play dumb is the only way to reach those kind of people.
What they are conveying is that “dude” is clearly not a gender-neutral term, as a straight guy would agree that they “fuck people”, weird as the phrasing is, but not that they “fuck dudes.” It demonstrates that they themselves don’t perceive the social understanding of the term “dude” as gender neutral, not that “fucking dudes” is bad. It could also be used to debate a lesbian by the same token.
Maybe if you lived in any of the countries you disparage all day long
Most of the users on Hexbear are American and a decent number of the remainder are Brits and Aussies. Our criticisms do not come from having never received the privilege of witnessing these countries being shit first-hand, as much as you might like to pretend it’s only those dirty foreigners not understanding your national glory.
I was continuing the train of thought that they are a troll farm employee, like I’ve spelled out in the other half dozen comments on this post. Their objective is literally to derail and misinform other countries that 90% of them have never visited, such great people, these troll farm employees.
Now, remind me again, where exactly did I say dirty foreigners? Oh. Just like a troll farmer, you always double-down on calling someone else racist when you’re losing the argument. Gotta have that re-direction.
So the foreigner part is self-evident, and I think the “second-world”, “potato vodka,” etc. covers the “dirty” pretty plainly. I don’t know why I’m even saying this, because basically what I’m doing is just teaching you to dogwhistle more effectively, but on the other hand this post is on lemmy, so hopefully I’m helping to point this out to other people so they will be more aware of these things when you and your ilk take your next crack at it.
Funny, I’ve kept my sights specifically on the troll farmers. You seem to be the one trying to leverage it into racism as some kind of ad hominem towards me. It’s fine, I understand you can’t keep up your focus on the losing argument at hand, so you have to redirect.
I don’t know a single trans person that views dude as a gender neutral term, the only people spouting that nonsense are transphobic cis dudes like you who make up excuses to misgender and harass us. Go die in a house fire, reactionary cissie shit.
Real talk from a very trans-supportive communist: is this universal? I definitely grew up in a conservative environment but definitely was under the impression that I and the trans people I am close to all thought dude was a term of endearment when used amongst friends, including women and enbys. I likely overuse the term from thinking I would be a skater after playing Tony hawk’s pro skater and being into hiking/climbing/camping culture, but is this a universal thing among trans people you know?
Not defending the other person, libs very often hide behind the argument once called out, and I’d never call you “dude,” or pretty much anyone not my direct friend, but I just wanna make sure I’m not hurting people unnecessarily without knowing it. Maybe it’s the “being friends” part that makes the difference, and I hope so. Otherwise I got some trans-comrades to apologize to
Adding here after thinking more, I guess I usually use it to refer to a non-specific thing, like saying “ah dude, that’s cool” and shit like that. Like saying “oh man.” Is this related??? Need some help here lol
Real talk from a very trans-supportive communist: is this universal?
I find it to be at least extremely common, both in English-speaking spaces online and in German-speaking trans communities online and IRL (i’m German). Ultimately it’s a matter of preference, there will be trans people who disagree, but there definitely are a lot of us who take offense. Same goes for terms like guy and especially for bro / bruh etc., or for German terms like Typ or Alter (in this context roughly comparable to guy or dude) which are generally at least masc-leaning. I’d definitely take offense to all of these, but sure, there are exceptions.
Still, these are exceptions, and more importantly, what we see here is a perfect example of how not to deal with such a situation: When somebody calls you out on misgendering, the only sensible response is to edit the post in question and to apologize. If you do that, it’s normally no big deal, everybody moves on with their day. And it takes a few seconds to edit a post and a few more to reply “sorry, i’ve edited this” while it can quickly take hours to start an argument over this. Yet i see over and over again that liberals in particular are incapable of showing that amount of basic human decency. Instead, they have to assert their privilege to define what we’re allowed to find offensive, talk down to us and act as if they’re the one ones who’ve been hurt because we’ve called their feeling of superiority and infallibility into doubt by saying they’ve made a mistake. That’s where it gets transphobic even if the misgendering was unintentional, that’s where it gets patronizing as well.
Fully agree with the description. Fuck that lib. Keep tearing them apart til they apologize and edit. hexbear-trans
In Dutch-speaking communities i still hear the American phrases a lot, but the equivalents in dutch rarely. But in international groups oriented towards my hobbies, dude is still used a good bit. But I’ll just stay alert, just wanted to hear a bit more from a trans-comrade who most definitely would speak frankly to me (I understand that in-person call-outs can sometimes be difficult for such “small” things). Gonna only use it as a phrase of exclamation among friends that know me well I think and continue checking up regularly on my comrades.
Just to be clear, i’m not saying “don’t say dude”, the term in itself is perfectly fine. Just saying it’s not unusual at all that trans people find it not to be gender neutral and particularly that the response in that case shouldn’t be to start an argument where you assert a right to label trans people in ways that have clearly and already hurt them. It’s the latter that made me go from “oof, that person should edit this post” to “scratch a liberal and a fascist bleeds”.
I blindly called someone dude on social media and you suggested I die in a house fire. While I regret doubling down on my crusade against trolls over this, your response seems entirely disproportionate.
I’ve already explained in this thread that on the mobile client (both Memmy and Wefwef), pronouns are not displayed. After this comment, I had to log on to desktop just to see what everyone was on about.
I’m here to confirm that it was a proverbial use of “dude”, like you might see used in movies such as The Big Labowski, The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Good Burger. It is pretty well established in the west that dude is used for about anyone.
I understand now that this might not be the case everywhere and I am truly sorry for any misunderstanding related to gender that I have caused here.
“All liberals are evil right-wing transphobes because someone called me ‘dude’,” might be the most… Eh, fuck it, this is why humanity deserves to burn. The whole earth is a circus and we clowns, as a species, will all get what we deserve.
Generally considering that “dude” is a somewhat masculine word, so using it to refer to someone with she/her pronouns in her username (implying that she doesn’t want to be referred to with male terms) without knowing if they’re okay with that word just makes you look like a piece of shit.
No the fuck it’s not. It’s used for everyone, it’s been used for everyone for decades at this point. Throwing a tantrum over being called a dude is plain fucking stupid, no girl I know takes issue with being called a dude, and they call each other dude. Shit’s genderless a f.
First of all, this thread is like, a month old? Why even bother responding to me at this time?
Anyway, “dude” is rarely gender neutral. Here are the two main definitions on Wikitionary:
(chiefly US, Canada, colloquial) A man, generally a younger man.
(colloquial, used in the vocative) A term of address for someone, typically a man, particularly when cautioning them or offering advice.
So yeah, totally a gender neutral word. /sarcastic
And it’s pretty obvious where the dogwhistle is, calling someone with she/her pronouns clearly listed a “dude” in a disparaging tone. Going “oh but it’s a gender neutral term” has the exact same level of insufferable, bad-faith smugness as an edgy 14-year old claiming that the swastikas they’re scrawling on their desk are actually Buddhist symbols.
In what way is making a kinda-funny Marxism joke indicative of being a bot? The previous comment to mine references Dialectics, because the convo is just "A, B, sassy A, sassy B. I merely tied in Historical Materialism, Marx’s grand Dialectical theory, to overplay the goofy small back and forth.
Are you sure you’re not a bot? Do you have free will?
This might be a “deep” and thought inspiring comment if the original post wasn’t calling liberals the loudest and dumbest people here. Yours was a nice try at establishing a false equivalence.
Okay just… there’s no such thing as ‘self’ projecting. It’s just projecting. That’s redundant.
And nothing they said is untrue. What kind of self flagellation is required to just say a type of political person is bad? Do you need permission from a conservative to talk shit about their faults?
You can project lots of different things. marx_mentat was attempting to project how liberals are the “Loudest and Dumbest” people on here. But in reality, he was really… self-projecting… oh shit. Did you see that? How that makes sense now? Nice try.
Not only can 2 things be bad but 2 things can be different degrees of bad.
I’d rather live in a country where I can openly criticize those in power without risk to my personal well-being and have the possibility for pushing my government towards positive ends.
Yeah there’s some risk associated with protesting in the US but at least I don’t have to worry about the going to the gulag or a tiananmen square situation.
I mean, I should have known you’d regurgitate the propaganda, but it’s always a disappointment anyway. Such a stupid response, too. That’s basically a non-sequitur. For one, there being two evils does not necessitate siding with the lesser. You can acknowledge there are no good guys, and instead pick the position most likely to lead to the least amount of suffering over all. That is and will always be peace, but you blood thirsty natoids just can’t imagine that. Your response is also dumb as hell given that modern Russia is a capitalist state, not the USSR lmao. Bringing up Gulags is a bit like bringing up slave plantations in the USA… except the USSR is actually completely dissolved so its even less relevant. For the record, the US still legally permits slavery in the instance of criminal conviction. Say, sure would be wild if the US disproportionately policed and convicted black and brown people, wouldn’t it? That’d seem like a loophole legitimizing slavery over time! But that’s just whatabouttism so feel free to ignore it like a good little natoid. You’re grossly ignorant regarding tiananmen square as well, but I won’t bother citing anything since you’ll just dismiss it out of hand.
Instead, I’ll ask what are your thoughts on the repression of Black Lives Matter, Occupy Wall Street, Ireland Independence, French Yellow Vests/Public Benefits/Police Racism, and so on and so forth in “Free” and “Democratic” countries? What about the United States having the highest incarceration rate in the world, largely filled with black and brown people subjected to forced labor while in prison? What would happen if your “protest” did more than carry signs in publicly designated and permitted areas? Wouldn’t you be beaten, arrested, and convicted under the fullest extent of the law? So sorry that you’re so cucked you can’t imagine doing more than asking your leaders nicely for change and politely going home when they say no, but real protest is certainly illegal in “Free” Western countries, and if you ever actually engaged in it you’d see exactly how brutal those governments can be.
Principled communists aren’t unapologetic supporters of every single thing socialist countries do/have done, but we take issue with the nakedly hypocritical framing from Western powers. The atomic unit of propaganda is emphasis. You ignorantly reduce entire foreign countries to a single word/event while myopically ignoring the conditions before and after, but hem and haw and whine about nuance and procedure and the necessity of the barbarity around us every day… When you’re not ignoring it outright that is. That’s what makes you a useful idiot to our own system of oppression. It’s an embarrassment.
Snowden, Assange, manning, dozens of maimed protestors and the largest prison system in the world would like a word with you after seeing what you just posted here.
In fairness dumb liberals have a hegemonic control of media, government, culture, and public opinion in the US and most of the EU, with the exception being almost entirely fascists.
I hate to quote a fascist beast like Patton, but; " “They’ve got us surrounded again, the poor bastards.”
We don’t have to go looking for liberal ignorance, violence, cowardice, and foolishness. It’s everywhere in every direction.
I swear to god I’ll buy sync premium if they give the ability to sort by controversial. This is the stupidest more redditesque thread I’ve run into and i don’t want to miss anymore.
Funny I would say the sane about the Marxists here most of whom seem to only be educated through social media/forums and most of whom seem to have no formal education in sociology/anthropology/and most especially economics. The number of times where it becomes clear that a Marxist is arguing from a conclusion is too high to be ignored.
Watch out people we got an econ 101 grad amongst us, if we’re not careful he’ll pull out his Mas Colell textbook and start babbling about maximizing utility curves and general equilibrium
Nah you have someone with a political science degree and a minor in econ. I have talked to many people who seem to have no formal education in the listed fields and refer back to things like breadtube as a valid source.
I can’t speak fir your education but I have chatted with someone who claimed to be a Marxist who was convinced that DPRK is a communist state rather than a hereditary autocracy. Not ever Marxist is educated and some are bad at reasoning.
you have someone with a political science degree and a minor in econ
Not even trying to dunk, just realize that this is not impressive, and certainly not authoritative. When someone questions your expertise the two acceptable responses are:
Yes, I am an actual expert, with extensive schooling and/or relevant work experience.
I’m not claiming to be an expert, but here’s where I’m getting my information, where are you getting yours?
They said I have 101. I have a greater understanding then that which is what Im replying to. Im not pretending to be an expert and frankly I don’t know why you would think that.
We know where they are getting the information from the problematic people Im talking about do not understand their sources and frequently decide that Marx was right and avoid learning when he was wrong ir when we have gained a clearer understanding.
For fucks sake some seem to think Marxism ended with Marx
Just giving you a second chance to answer the simplest possible question about Marx. I’m guessing you didn’t see the notification the first time given you’ve been active after it was posted, and you could very easily demonstrate your knowledge of Marxism.
You know, cause otherwise people are going to think you were lying about learning about Marxism.
You are going to have to ask me "the simplest question about Marx"again because the button that should link me to the context isn’t working right now. I definitely missed it the last time.
He’s got a MINOR in economics! And he’s here to tell us all about how beautiful and elegant the math is. You can’t really appreciate it unless you step into the rarified air surrounding an econometrics professor, you would understand if you ever tried it.
Nah you have someone with a political science degree and a minor in econ. I have talked to many people who seem to have no formal education in the listed fields and refer back to things like breadtube as a valid source.
So the two most “priesthood class of capital” useless degrees lol.
Read Capital, the economics you’ve learned still haven’t grappled with it successfully.
Edit: you claim to have read Marx. Please, tell me how automation connects to the tendency of the rate of profit to drop according to Marx. It’s one of the core parts of his analysis so it should be easy to remember.
This is extra funny because explaining how neoclassical economics is a religion rather than any form of scientific or even material system is a common criticism made by Anthropologists.
But anthropology doesn’t have the nice graphics and the math that doesn’t really have any empirical data behind it, anthropology isn’t a real science unlike neoclassical economics!
The DPRK is socialist and not a hereditary autocracy. It has been the consistent direction of the head of the executive branch to diffuse authority to other offices, but nearly everything you have ever heard about this country was a lie.
It literally has handed power down from father to son twice. That is a hereditary system. As the citizens cannot advocate for a change in leaders, a change in direction of the party or an entirely new political system they are authoritarian.
It literally has handed power down from father to son twice.
It has had sons win elections and then hold the office twice. We can call it dynastic in a sense similar to US political dynasties, but that’s different from being literally hereditary.
As the citizens cannot advocate for a change in leaders, a change in direction of the party or an entirely new political system
Do you have a source for that claim because I have only seen the opposite from elections experts. The fact that almost every single person votes is of course a MASSIVE red flag.
I believe participation is mandatory, like in Australia, and given the travel limitations (the part of a percent that doesn’t vote are usually people traveling), it makes sense that it would be so high. Of course, since we have a wonderful freedom of speech in this country where the rich are free to buy media companies and promote the stories they want to promote, the idea of actually investigating the elections for a purpose other than vilification is hardly going to creep into search engine results. Here’s a compilation of sources that attempt to explore it from that angle:
Or some of us might have multiple sociology degrees and/or are in academia. But I’m sure if they wrote comments about Marx (or Weber or Gramsci or Veblen etc) you’d just assume they got it from wikipedia anyway. Though I’m not sure why that’s a bad thing. It’s not like it makes a difference whether someone read primary texts online or overpaid at the college bookstore. It’s the same information. The fact that anyone has a desire to learn, better themselves, and then try to use that knowledge is admirable and a service to society at large. More people should try it.
Im not talking about people who are educated with degrees taught by experts. Im talking about the person who only learns about this stuff through places like facebook, tiktok, youtube and to a lesser extent reddit (one of the major mods on the econ subs, /u/robthorpe, is a Marxist).
The problem with learning from forums is as a novice you have no way of telling that the person running the forum has any idea what they are talking about.
I think some subjects are better learned when you have actual experts to turn to and you might not have that on say the facebook group you ran across.
For example there’s a reply here from someone complaining that modern economics still hasn’t answered everything from Kapital which ignores that modern economics and economics of Marx’s time are very different in methodology and focus.
The number of times where it becomes clear that a Marxist is arguing from a conclusion is too high to be ignored.
That’s just how Marxism is, he claimed that our course of economic history is the only way it could have gone with a single data point then concluded that the current system (in 1850) would imminently collapse.
I don’t know why anyone lends credence to his theories
Because he was correct about some things. Modern neoclassical economics abandoned the stuff that is no longer correct or is not relevant after the movement towards empiricism.
Bro I’m completing a dissertation in political economy and I hate myself for it. The world is an easy place if you assume the gospel drivel spewed in orthodox econ departments is all there is. How about you go read up on the Cambridge Capital debate and then tell me how robust a “science” economics is. While you’re at it eat a crayon, maybe you’ll shit out a more intelligent comment next time.
First why do you think that you or only Marxists are aware of the limitations of social sciences? If you really do have a background in the subject surely you remember this is frequently discussed or it least it was in my programs.
Second if you do have a degree or are pursuing one then you aren’t the person Im talking about. Im talking about the person who-reads Marx and maybe Kropotkin and decides things ended there.
For someone attacking my intelligence/education, which you know nothing of, you are making a ton of unsupported statements. Hypocrisy isn’t a good look
I’m not talking about the inherent limitations of social science, I’m responding to your absurd attitude that somehow formal education makes your ideas inherently superior/above critique, and I named a specific example of theoretical failure of orthodox economics as an example of the entire project being basically woo. Lots of aristotelean scholastics wrote the dumbest shit imaginable about physics for a thousand years, and their thought was funded, reproduced, and taught as authoritative by formal education the entire time; progress was only made when criticism came from outside the academy and overcame it. Much like then, our contemporary “Political Science” and “Economics” departments are nearly completely captured by a dead-end ideology/research project, but still have the support of the ruling class so they keep cranking along misinforming more and more students every year. You claiming advanced understanding of the matter is the equivalent of an Aristotelean physicist or Lamarkian biologist sticking their nose up and saying learning outside of the academy is somehow less than their own. That’s worse than just being wrong, it’s wrong and using elitism to refuse to recognize it. The Black Panthers went into the poorest and least educated communities in America, and they taught people Marxist theory while they taught them to read. What do you think well to do Nixon Republicans had to say about their education? That’s where you stand right now looking down on folks engaging in education outside of the academy itself.
Also, lots of Marxists are tired of dumb liberals reciting the same garbage authoritatively while never questioning basic undercurrents of their own ideological world view. So sorry they have reached a conclusion and don’t want to rehash baby’s first socialism with every shmuck who thinks their poli-sci degree makes them an expert.
My point is that some subjects, like modern economics, are best taught in academic situations because of how complex they are. There is simply too much higher level math in neoclassical economics to learn on your own unless you are a math wiz.
Why are you presuming liberals are dumb? Liberal societies are functioning in the real world while the most successful attempts at socialism are those that moved towards hybrid economies (Vietnam and China).
Arguing from a conclusion means you have decided what is correct and then seek proof to demonstrate that which is the opposite of how scientific reasoning works. You should probably be familiar with that term if you are not.
You’re still not getting it lol. Neoclassical economics is theoretically standing out way over a cliff and simply refusing to look down like Wiley coyote. Your appeal to mathematics is unintentionally hilarious, because it was physics envy and the chasing of mathematical models over real life evidence/coherent theory that led the field astray to begin with lmao. You can come up with all kinds of fancy models and as much mathematics as you like, but none of it matters if you’re basing it on incorrect axioms.
“Functioning in the real world” - oh yeah for sure. Burning the environment down and cooking the biosphere while forever chemicals and microplastics permanently saturate the ecosystem. Liberal societies are “Functioning” in so far as they’re not actively failed states this very moment, but that is accomplished on the back of neo-imperialism, unequal exchange with the global south, and unresolvable contradictions inherent to neo-liberalism/capitalism. A car driving 80 mph towards a cliff is working, sure, but is that a desirable state of affairs?
Also take a quick look around my guy. We’re not in a laboratory. I’m calling you an idiot on the internet. Not every conversation is the platonic ideal of scientific pursuit you nerd.
And Im trying to remain a better class of person than you because you have demonstrated nothing other than that you are the exact type of uneducated person Im talking about. Your incapability to reason civilly or rationally will not help you even in the most utopian Marxist society.
Hear that @Civility? I’ve been a bad boy! Come frown at me for hurting the widdle wiberals feelings. He was just using elitism to disparage his interlocutors and maintain a worldview that harms people every day! Why did I have to go and be so uncivil! Whoa is me.
Classic liberal. When confronted with arguments you don’t understand or have a retort to, you pearl clutch and complain about tone.
Idk, if it was so plainly “false” and “uneducated” then it seems like it shouldn’t be that hard to provide a refutation of, especially since these are criticisms that even several liberal economists have been making for decades, e.g. “assume a can-opener” discourse.
And he is talking about axioms, so you don’t even need to worry about correctly notating your fancylad mathematics.
I will have you know that I majored in political science and have a minor in economics. I have achieved the apex of knowledge on both subjects, thank you very much.
Nah, Libs are like this everywhere. The self righteousness, the aggressive ignorance, the near absolutely inability to recognize their own limitations, the incuriousness. I think it’s mostly a consequence of living in a hegemonic cultural and media environment where they never encounter any meaningful challenges to their world view. Liberalism is all they know, and the only thing outside of it that they even casually encounter is fascism through the lens of Lib media venues, so they’re just completely unprepared to critique their own beliefs or situation.
Why are you presuming liberals are dumb? Liberal societies are functioning in the real world while the most successful attempts at socialism are those that moved towards hybrid economies (Vietnam and China).
The case of Vietnam and China is well-explained in Chinese Marxist economic study and experience (not that you would know this), as Primary Stage Socialism. To explain this, it’s necessary to look at the history of these two countries. Before Vietnam emerged under modern socialist-orientation it was being pillaged by French then Japanese then French (again) colonialism; the French were overthrown by the Vietnamese, with France receiving support for some time from America until the U.S. decided they wanted the territory for themselves, where they bombed the country emerging just out of colonialism into oblivion, killing 1M+ for their resources until they were forced out, then employing sanctions and IMF pressure afterwards. This is clearly not an orthodox path of economic development and not conducive to a balanced test of economic competition that you’re implying. You of course know of China’s underdevelopment under semi-feudalism and semi-colonialism prior to socialist-orientation (with U.S. support for the KMT as the communists won the civil war).
Now I didn’t think I’d have to explain this, but the Marxist analysis isn’t “state ownership is good at all times and private ownership is bad at all times”; first there’s the question of class orientation of the state, tearing apart this ridiculous “mixed economy” nonsense, which is really just a method of obscuring this fact and simplifying economics into a ratio of (private/”public”, with both metrics gaining new context under different orientations of the class dictatorship, especially the latter). You cannot simply fully nationalize a drastically underdeveloped economy (nor is this the traditional socialist/Marxist prescription, with Engels stating for instance in Principles of Communism, “Will it be possible for private property to be abolished at one stroke? No, no more than existing forces of production can at one stroke be multiplied to the extent necessary for the creation of a communal society. In all probability, the proletarian revolution will transform existing society gradually and will be able to abolish private property only when the means of production are available in sufficient quantity.”
Scientific socialism is specifically the approach that states that different scales of production demand different and mirrored relations of production which then determine the social relations of that society. Separate forms and scales of production demand the supremacy of separate emerging and progressive classes (just as feudalism nurtured and birthed the early bourgeoise to overthrow it, so that same bourgeoisie will eventually nurture its own successor, the proletariat, by virtue of the socialization of production and the decay of the capitalist mode of production). Primary Stage Socialism is specifically a new concept created by Deng Xiaoping to flesh out an understanding of the development of socialism on an underdeveloped platform. The basic explanation is that in developed countries there will be large-scale capitalist production, then revolution, then advanced socialism, whereas in artificially underdeveloped countries there will be revolution, then the development of large-scale capitalist production, then advanced socialism. The common enemy of imperialism nullifies the singular revolutionary character of the national bourgeoisie and, with the masses gaining new understanding from this experience, the dictatorship of the proletariat (typically headed by the proletariat with a mass base of the peasantry, as in China’s PDD). The objective under this new governance is to “modernize” the forces of production (by utilizing foreign investment, the patriotic national bourgeoisie, and market relations) so that they may correspond to this progressive class leadership and under this progressive class leadership as well as build the framework for socialist relations of production (directly state owned economy is still dominant in China). This isn’t some smashing rebuttal of socialism, nor is this “total/vs. mixed economy” nonsense anything other than a false dichotomy. These nations assumed this theory and practice because it is the correct approach (and not in the revisionist sense of abandoning Marxism-Leninism), and this notion of failure of socialism is a complete misunderstanding.
As for liberalism, it works for the bourgeoisie, is the ultimate ideology of the bourgeoisie undercutting all obstacles of outdated social (and economic thought to an extent) thought that hinders the bourgeoisie while uplifting this group and maintaining their select privileges. The vast majority of those ascribing to “liberalism” as an ideology do not belong to the select privileged group for which the ideology is oriented, and are defending demonstrably incorrect incorrect ideas with relation to the “second” and third world and upholding the pretexts of the dominant class not as a matter of sly infiltration but genuine mistaken belief (and the person you were replying to never stated that all people who uphold liberalism are genuinely confused or dumb, but that they had been arguing with those who are (talking incorrectly and against their ultimate interests). The misnomer of liberal societies “functioning” lies in the fact that “functioning” is seen as a blind metric (success/failure) rather than a relative idea (with certain modes functioning for certain groups, usually for those by which they were designed and carried out). China has been growing at a much faster rate than “liberal societies”, and is doing so without engaging in imperialism and massacring millions of people for regional influence and natural resources. Your entire critique is useless.
Goddamn. You both treated him with more respect and time/attention than he deserved AND savaged him. I love Hexbear users. I was running out of patience and felt my fingers itching for a ppb soon.
You do not know what I do and do not know. I am aware that the theoretical path to communism is not the same for all but China keeps moving further away from ANY path to socialism or communism. Heck they really doubled down on authoritarianism when they allowed Xi to permanently hold office. Is a dictatorial state run for privately profit a path to socialism? Oh shit no it isn’t
No because he was elected. If he got the office right after TDR held it as the first POTUS and then it was passed to another Roosevelt then yes I would think he’s a dictator.
Im unaware of ANYONE claiming DPRK has fair elections. If you have a valid source that makes this claim I would love to see it because on the surface they are clearly fraudulent.
OP is talking about how FDR was the first president to be elected for three terms, which is the same situation for Xi. Are you confusing the PRC and DPRK?
I wrote something on the DPRK’s elections a while ago [link]—the “hereditary” (of which positions are diffused, with the SAC being a modern development of decentralization) succession is a product of extreme hardship from being bombed to shit and starved and occupied by the U.S, and deciding upon candidates that are seen as “successors” to the pioneer of the country/visage who defeated the imperialists; whether or not this is correct in your eyes means nothing.
Im replying without the ability to place this in context as rn that button does not function fir me, so yes I believe I am confusing DPRK and PRC.
In Xi’s case laws needed to be changed to give him the ability to run a third time. IMO moving towards a more authoritarian state is never going to result in a move towards socialism as it further entrenches power in an elite.
The fact is DPRK has a hereditary leadership and the state seems to work to perpetuate that. The fact that there were historical justifications made for Kim Il Sung to pass it to his son is meaningless. DPRK has electoral turnouts that almost assure that the results are fake and it is hard to see an authoritarian state whose leadership has been inherited along family lines as anything other than the autocratic monarchy it is.
In Xi’s case laws needed to be changed to give him the ability to run a third time. IMO moving towards a more authoritarian state is never going to result in a move towards socialism as it further entrenches power in an elite.
Authoritarianism (rule by authority) isn’t a valid concept (by which manner of authority? the authority of which class?). All societies are ruled by blind authority, but the status quo asserts itself as natural and everything against it becomes “authoritarian.” The immediate aim of the liquidation of the national bourgeoisie’s political power taken up by the dictatorship of the proletariat is not in any sense removed from bourgeois power elsewhere. This point manifests itself in the consideration of the state of the press, which has more and more become a close link between the capitalist class at large, a class that retains a political dictatorship over the majority of developed nations and several national dictatorships over their respective colonial shares of maldeveloped nations. Owing to the supreme authority of the world bourgeoisie, the proletarian masses who have consolidated political power domestically must suppress the siege on their delicate rule internationally. There are more prisoners per-capita and in total in the U.S. than in China, not to mention the clear difference in ownership of the factors of production, and yet this “authoritarianism” comes up again and again in rhetoric
I explained the term limit change in my other reply to you [link]. There is no possible way to categorize this as “authoritarian” or “entrenching power in the elite.”
This is an extreme non-reply. Leadership in the DPRK is diffused (explanation below). You never explain how “the state seems to work to perpetuate [hereditary succession, although succession is complex, as I already mentioned with the diffusion of power from Kim Il Sung].”
The fact that there were historical justifications made for Kim Il Sung to pass it to his son is meaningless.
Actually it explains the reason why voters might follow this pattern, and of course nothing in the article I wrote was addressed. As for “hereditary monarchy claims”, Kim Jong Un is General Secretary of the Workers Party of Korea, and Chairman of the State Affairs Commission. These positions are elected by the WPK Party Congress and by the Supreme People’s Assembly respectively.
Sidenote: parties are elected by the people every five years (under the DFRF), the WPK isn’t permanently leading [other parties include the KSDP and the CCP]
If Kim Jong Un didn’t wish to continue to hold his positions, one of the Vice-Chairpersons would take his place temporarily, and a successor would be discussed and elected at the next party conference, also likely a Vice-Chairperson. For example, Kim Jong Il was elected into the Party Central Committee in the 70’s, and in 1974 was elected as the successor to Kim Il Sung. Jang Song-Thaek was elected to succeed Kim Jong Il, however, he wanted to reform certain areas, thus debate regarding his intentions and whether he was a revisionist or not ensued; the party then switched and had Kim Jong Un succeed Kim Jong Il. Jang Song-Thaek then staged a coup in an attempt to consolidate power by force (confirming his intentions were not pure and that he was likely a revisionist in the intent of his “reform”). He was executed thereafter. It’s important to mention Jang Song-Thaek to show that a successor to Chairman of the SAC doesn’t have to be a direct child of the former. So, if Kim Jong Un were to retire, or wish to discontinue his positions, it would be somebody in the Politburo, or a Vice-Chairperson of the State Affairs Commission, to succeed him. However, there currently isn’t an elected successor appointed, because likely odds are that he isn’t retiring or dying in the near future. Kim Jong Un is not actually in total control of the DPRK; the Supreme People’s Assembly has, by far, the extreme majority of control over the latter. Kim Jong Un has never been in either the Supreme People’s Assembly or its respective Standing Committee. Premier is the second top rank within the SPA, currently held by Kim Jae Ryong [not related]. President of the Standing Committee (Presidium) is the top position within the SPA, a position held by Kim Yong-Nam [not related] until April 2019, where Choe Ryong-Hae thereafter was elected. That isn’t to say that Kim Jong Un holds no power within the DPRK, but anyone within the SPA certainly has more legislative authority. Each person within the SPA, including Premier and Head of the Presidium, is elected (and thus their power is temporary and can be removed at any time). The closest thing to a dictatorship (so to speak) in the DPRK is the Dictatorship of the Proletariat, a determining class dictatorship of the majority which governs the state. The only of the Kim family members (remember this is a common Korean surname, I am referring to the lineage of Kim Il Sung) to have an SPA position was Kim Il Sung, and he abolished his position. The “next in line” leader in the WPK is likely not to be a descendant of Kim Il Sung either.
I want to keep on insulting the man good cop bad cop style, but now I’m learning, and I’m content to let him keep saying vapid bullshit if it means you keep posting bangers.
I know that you misunderstood the comment on liberalism (which I corrected), I know that your understanding of “socialism vs. mixed economy” is fundamentally nonsense, of course you didn’t bother to respond to any of this.
To respond to this new comment, China is under PSS, which means that the incorrect policy of over-nationalization was corrected and the country was opened up; prior to the centennial goal of developed socialism (2049/2050, precursor to communism), the purpose of state planning is to expand the productive forces to prepare for the elimination of private property. This is where you find a path seemingly “away from” socialism, but its purpose is specifically complex and not observable as such. I’m unsure how you ascertained this trend, and since you provide no examples, there’s nothing to respond to. Read this thoroughly sourced essay (and this as well) on China’s economy disproving your assertion, if you have any specific grievances not addressed then list them and I can respond.
As for “authoritarianism”, the National People’s Congress (which elects the president) is composed of delegates elected by the people. Xi could hold office for a long time, but his terms are five years long after which the president is elected again (and the NPC can depose him at any time by popular vote in the case of emergency). What you’re referring to is a decision by the NPC to remove term limits (whose purpose in this case is only undemocratic and limiting of the people’s will), so that a president could extend beyond the prior decided two-term limit if voted for a third (which in the first place is only a decision to correct the discrepancy between CPC gensec and president). Is this authoritarianism? As for “dictatorial state” (your only evidence is not indicative of this), the central government and CPC have majority support according to Harvard with lower majority support as well in local governments because of infrastructure and public enrichment programs. The CPC comprises of 10% of the eligible population and is a mass party which is not run for “privately profit [sic]” here’s another article on the class character of the people’s gov..
He’s pretty clearly misunderstood entirely or at least the point of 80% of what I said alone. This man is a weenie and the absolute epitome of someone who took Econ 101 and now thinks they know the secrets of the universe. It’s incredible how much air economics departments blow up their students ass. That just can’t be safe for the human body.
I STILL WANT MY MAN’S THOUGHTS ON THE CAMBRIDGE CAPITAL DEBATE.
“It is important, for the record, to recognize that key participants in the debate openly admitted their mistakes. Samuelson’s seventh edition of Economics was purged of errors. Levhari and Samuelson published a paper which began, ‘We wish to make it clear for the record that the nonreswitching theorem associated with us is definitely false. We are grateful to Dr. Pasinetti…’ (Levhari and Samuelson 1966). Leland Yeager and I jointly published a note acknowledging his earlier error and attempting to resolve the conflict between our theoretical perspectives. (Burmeister and Yeager, 1978).
However, the damage had been done, and Cambridge, UK, ‘declared victory’: Levhari was wrong, Samuelson was wrong, Solow was wrong, MIT was wrong and therefore neoclassical economics was wrong. As a result there are some groups of economists who have abandoned neoclassical economics for their own refinements of classical economics. In the United States, on the other hand, mainstream economics goes on as if the controversy had never occurred. Macroeconomics textbooks discuss ‘capital’ as if it were a well-defined concept — which it is not, except in a very special one-capital-good world (or under other unrealistically restrictive conditions). The problems of heterogeneous capital goods have also been ignored in the ‘rational expectations revolution’ and in virtually all econometric work.”
(Burmeister 2000)
Awh gee, I wonder where our Poli-sci wonderboy got his degree curious-marx
For all of their bluster about “starting from a conclusion and working backwards” it’s hilarious watching them start at the beginning with the conclusion that they know better than everyone else (with literally only an undergraduate politics and econ minor as proof) and never deviating or questioning that premise for a single moment throughout this entire thread with zero irony.
There could not be a flimsier conclusion for someone to work backwards from. They are a happy puppy arrogantly discarding everything they encounter (and I really do mean everything) with complete confidence they are the biggest dog in the yard.
I’m a biologist, but my college offered a few humanities courses, so I took an introductory course in economics.
The maths was fine; it was mostly linear equations and differentiation. But the priors seemed to defy all logic and common sense. It was like a physicist assuming that there was no friction. The impression I got was that economists put too much effort into mathematical rigour and too little into empirical verification.
Now there are biologists who study animal societies and their ‘economic systems’. But they care more for experiments than for theory, and this seems to me to be the more reasonable approach.
Marxists are hardly alone in arguing from a conclusion. That pretty much describes all of economics and most of political science. Liberal economics in particular could easily be retitled Just So Stories, With Jargon.
That’s simply not true and strongly suggests that you either did not understand who I am talking about or ypu have no education in the field.
Im talking about the people who come to Marxism by deciding it is correct and then seek to only pursue information or sources that back Marxism rather than learning about the various flaws that absolutely exist in Marxism as they do in any ideologically driven perspective. If you actually study econ you should have some grasp on the flaws of a system in broad terms.
The fact that you are assigning an ideology to neoclassical economists strongly suggests you have no formal education in the field. Most economists abandoned the idea of “schools” in the 1960s.
You really need to look into the concept of cultural hegemony. Your ignorance as you speak with authority is embarrassing but it isnt an innate quality you have and can be corrected.
You see, the Political Scientist major brainpan is maladapted to reflection, and quite simply incapable of grasping such remarkable and sophisticated concepts like “Hegemony.”
Economists hate this one SECRET HACK you can do to avoid poordom. Among investmentology specialists it is a well guarded secret that switching to a making money framework instead of the popular losing money framework has a long term net positive effect on your private economy.
Turns out the local company that made bootstraps for 125 years was bought out by a hedge fund, which promptly fired all of the workers and subcontracted manufacturing to a company in Sri Lanka who could make them much cheaper by using inferior materials and by paying the Sri Lankan workers in 6 months what a fired local worker made in a day.
Ironically, the hedge fund CEO with the MBA he received as a legacy admission to Cornell only wears slippers because fuck you, I'm the boss.
Hold on bucko, the corporate police noticed that you were saying seditious statements about our glorious brand. The shareholders will decide your fate.
I think to save money you should skip dinner. Breakfast food is generally cheaper. Big breakfast at 10-11am. Late lunch at 4-5pm and a light dinner if hungry at night is more economical
If I had a forint for something matching order in Hungary and Japan, I would have 2 forints, which isn’t a lot but its weird it happened twice. (Its the order of names and dates)
I use this for notes, and generally everything written; mainly for reference when looking back on old information. Today, whether I say Wednesday the 9th, or 2023-08-09, it’s fairly inconsequential, but in 2-3 years if I have to reference a note, email or something else where I said today’s date, I won’t have to compare the date of the note to the calendar for that time period to see which 9th was on a Wednesday.
Everything you do now becomes history, so adapting to this format makes it easier when today becomes your history.
But we read left to right and the most important part is furthest right hardest to read. It’s convenient for computers sorting alphabetically, but bad for people reading it.
But that’s good, like a parity check. Because your wrong by much more, it’s easier to tell from context clues. That’s why people abbreviated the year to ‘in 98’ or something like that.
With other numbers, non-date numbers, we put the numbers representing the most quantity to the left, and numbers representing the last quantity to the right, eg 1 hundred, ten and 1 would be 111, where the number representing 100 qty comes first from the left, and each position moving to the right, represents a smaller and smaller amount.
Since years are longer than months, which are longer than days, the YYYY-MM-DD format actually follows the same convention that we commonly use for all other numbering systems, big on the left, small on the right.
I’m O- so I give two units of red cells and get saline and the plasma/antibodies back. The guy at the donation site says “make sure you don’t drink any alcoholic beverages for 24 hours…but you can have one if you want.” He looks back to see if his manager is around and then whispers “you can have two but don’t leave the house.”
It’s a requirement at Red Cross but it’s just a recommendation at Vitalent- anyone can do anything but they have “ideal” donation types for each blood type.
They are still used in finance. There are a lot of antiquated technologies finance still uses because some random broker with millions of dollars on his book of business just says “nah, I am not using the new stuff”.
Wasn’t there some way to fingerprint typewriters as well based on yhe exact shape of the letter stencils? I vaguely remember something like that being an actual thing for solving crimes
Someone should tell Cannon, Pacific Office Automation, and my office that printers are retro then. Because my workplace operates off paper still, not my department, but everyone else.
Kind of an an-prim take. Understand the technology you’re using. The only thing you should take for granted is that any opportunity tech has to spy on you has already been exploited by multiple outlets. Use your worst possible faith and you’ll probably still fall short of what’s happening.
Or do while making sure you 100% know WTF you are doing. Some modern tech, like onion routing and encryption, are still very useful.
But if you're not the kind of person who can convert a 32 bit hex number to decimal in your head or recognize a JTAG port on a device when you see it, then yeah stay away.
…a newspaper that totally exists with only the first letter in its name capitalized, no bylines, heinous grammatical errors, and two-sentence leading articles which end without punctuation?
Could be like a school paper or somethin, but the shadow of the letters from the backside seems like its not just any old standard paper print. So at least someone tried to make it look real.
It’s from a newspaper article meme generator that’s been around since the late 2000s I believe. I used to use it myself. It lets you input your text, date, and title.
I discovered yesterday that they no longer sell 16 ounce containers of ricotta cheese. They're all now 15oz or 30oz. So if you have a recipe that needs four cups of cheese you have to either adjust the rest of the recipe down or deal with having a 1/4 cup less cheese than you really need.
Someone gave me a Hello Fresh gift code. It doesn’t fully cover the large meal plan so I have the choise of paying 5 bucks extra or taking the smaller deal and leaving money in the table
You’re not leaving money on the table if you take the smaller deal. If you buy the large meal plan, you were successfully manipulated into buying something you wouldn’t have considered otherwise.
Ricotta isn’t a block cheese that you can buy pre-shredded like cheddar. It’s a pretty wet cheese and is usually sold in tubs in your basic markets, kind of like cottage cheese.
I’ve made obscene amounts of home make macaroni and cheese over the last 20+ years and haven’t had a problem with it. I know it’s a funny place some people get passionate about, but the “anti-clumping agents” are typically some form of vegetable starch or fiber. If I’m making a cheese sauce I’m already using flour to help thicken and stabilize it anyway, so I don’t think the trace amounts really matter.
It matters more, in my opinion, for stuff like pizza because there isn’t already flour. The melting is noticeably different between shredded mozz and a block of low-moisture you cut or shredded yourself. But for cheese sauces and stuff I agree there isn’t really a difference
You forgot the endless popups in the 2000s, which led to every browser integrating a popup blocker since then (and which often fail to stop actual malicious popups, no less)
Yes, in these years are a lot of pop ups, pop unders among other crap in some pages, but normally in most pages there was, apart of an ocassinal Banner not much else to justify an adblocker. But nowadays, between ads, clickbaits, cookie consent, adblocker detections and ant-adblocker, paywalls and other shit like these, you need a lot of extensions and scripts if you don’t want that the page fills your browser and HD with all kind of PUPs and unwanted scripts, apart of an ad/trackerblocker. It’s a cats and mouse game between companies which want to track and profile you with all kind of dirty tricks, and the user and devs continuos searching contrameasures to show them the middle finger.
Just watched Elemental last night. The marketing really was the reason it bombed. The trailers made it look like a forbidden love story, but it was actually about the struggles of immigrant families and 2nd generation immigrants’ pressures of living up to their parents’ dreams.
Lmao I saw that meme a while ago but completely forgot about it until the scene came up. Honestly, the character wasn’t on it enough to be annoying. He had like less than a minute of total screen time even with all the dumb pickup lines.
I’d put it in the ran-out-of-other-things-to-watch category. It’s not bad, but not the best either. It had pacing issues, inconsistencies with how their world works, and some plot holes, but the animation was great and there were some genuinely funny lines.
That is 100% why I didn’t care. Hell a friend of mine had a copy and I wasn’t even interested cuz the trailer made it sound like the most 2008 thing to ever exist
It lacked the wide age range appeal other Pixar movies manage to pull off. I didn’t like the fundamental elements as a metaphor for race/culture either, it’s sort of racist to imply people of different backgrounds are so fundamentally different like that, although it did serve as a strong visual for the story. It would have been more accurate if the characters were projecting fundamental differences on to the same element, like different phases of water or something. That was the only real thing I thought was actually wrong with it, otherwise it just lacked the magic that other Pixar movies have.
We don’t really read the reviews for anything. We pirate everything cause fuck corporations. Our kids never saw anything about elemental but the cover. They love it.
Very interesting how all those “pretend socialists” only exist in the third world, and all the “real socialists” existin the west. Yet all the successful revolutions have been done in the third world by “pretend socialists”, and the so called “real socialists” in the west have accomplished nothing. Their biggest success of the “real socialists” in the west being capitalist welfare states or social democracies that rely on old school imperial relationships to fund their welfare in a select few areas.
No Eurocentrism present to this line of thought here at all…
What do you think of Nelson Mandela OP? He was a very good leader, right? You know that he considered Cuba an ally and supported their revolution as Cuba sent troops to fight against the apartheid government in the border wars, took inspiration from Mao and called the Chinese revolution a miracle, thanked the Soviets for giving unending support in the fight against apartheid while receiving the a Lenin Peace Prize? So is Nelson Mandela now a fascist according to your meme?
Authoritarian nations I can name off the top of my head tend to be near the top of that “chart”; I certainly don’t think Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia, Maoist China or Trump’s America are “okay”, especially not just because of the leader’s skin color or ancestry.
All governments are authoritarian. Its a meaningless term. Its usually thrown at any state opposing the US as part of the xenophobic rhetoric used in western propoganda toward its enemies.
Lumping nazis and other fascists in with communists is a technique used to smear socialism and make nazis look less bad. Its nazi apologia
Nelson Mandela was not a great man. At least not great enough to be so admired while F.W De Klerk had his funeral protested (F.W De Klerk helped end Apartheid).
Nelson Mandela did no more besides be a figurehead and help make a constitution that no one (not even when he was in power) follows. The ANC is corrupt to this day
I’m South African, I know who F.W de Klerk is. Don’t lie about what he did, there’s a reason he was unanimously booed while receiving his joint noble peace prize. He didn’t help end apartheid, he was forced into a position where it was the only viable option. Pure pragmatism. He was a member of the NP for many years, he willingly joined that organisation at the height of apartheid in 1972. If he was actually interested in ending fighting apartheid, he would have joined a liberation movement, not the apartheid party.
de Klerk was an apartheid president that was so corrupt he ordered the incineration of evidence of his, and his parties, corruption and crimes against humanity to be carried out by industrial steel smelters. Not to mention what he did with all the “third force” shenanigans towards the end of apartheid that almost caused civil war. It’s been revealed that he knew all about it. Or all the racist things he said later in life that revealed his true character, such as refusing to call apartheid a crime against humanity. Yes, I also used to be a liberal that thought de Klerk was a good guy that helped end apartheid, that was until I actually decided to do some research into the matter. Nelson Mandela said it best when it comes to de Klerk:
“Despite his seemingly progressive actions, Mr de Klerk was by no means the great emancipator…He did not make any of his reforms with the intention of putting himself out of power. He made them for precisely the opposite reason: to ensure power for the Afrikaner in a new dispensation.”
Yes the ANC is now extremely corrupt, it was effectively couped by corporate interests in the late 90s and early 2000s. Remember the move from RPD to GEAR? Thabo Mbeki and Trevor Manuel? Ramaphosa running away to make money in McDonalds and mining instead of succeeding Mandela? Leaving the door open for Mbeki to become president, a self described Thacherite who instituted austerity measures, underfund Eskom and give South Africa it’s first bout of load shedding, and denied that HIV causes AIDS, killing hundreds of thousands in the process? This all paved the way for Zuma’s corruption and ineptitude, and for Ramaphosa to come back, even after his shameful involvement in Marikana. Yes the ANC is shamefully corrupt, incompetent and useless, and it’s interesting to look at exactly how it got to that position.
The best results (for certain degrees of “good”, see the “Fuck Cars” movement, #MoreThanJustBikes and Racist by Design for its downsides) from any socialist experiment to ever be undertaken was, of all things, the US Interstate Highway Act. Yes, the highways that serve as the beacon of Capitalist freedom are also socialist; they’re funded by taxes.
Now, Communism is another beast entirely. In a Communist society, 100% of the economy is planned and funded by taxes; this quite simply puts too much power in too few hands, much like America’s current corporate oligarchy but as a nationalized monopoly. Authoritarians adore a concentration of power and will consume and violate powerful positions if given the option.
A government railroad is not communism. A public school system is not communism.
The reason to fear communism is because it is designed by extremely authoritarian individuals, not because it runs off your tax dollars.
Socialism is an aquarium within which the communist fish (communist nations) are dead but the capitalist fish (corporations) are the tiny fish feeding of the remaining government fish (the modern globalized nations of the world, regardless of stability, technology or form of government), which vary in health and size but are generally bigger and healthier than the capitalist fish… Except day by day the government fish get thinner and weaker and certain capitalist fish get fat off the blood they leech. The blood is tax-funded resources like health care, and the capitalist fish which aren’t growing fat off the government fish are the charities, unions and the average persons who collect food for and pick parasites off the skin of the government fish.
Obviously that’s abstract, but the relationship is basically that. You are already socialist, you just don’t realise socialism can exist beyond the trap that is planned economics.
Yes, the highways that serve as the beacon of Capitalist freedom are also socialist; they’re funded by taxes.
Socialism is when the government does stuff
Socialism is an aquarium within which the communist fish (communist nations) are dead but the capitalist fish (corporations) are the tiny fish feeding of the remaining government fish (the modern globalized nations of the world, regardless of stability, technology or form of government), which vary in health and size but are generally bigger and healthier than the capitalist fish… Except day by day the government fish get thinner and weaker and certain corporate fish get fat off the blood they leech. The blood is tax-funded resources like health care, and the capitalist fish which aren’t growing fat off the government fish are the charities, unions and the average persons who collect food for and pick parasites off the skin of the government fish.
jesse-wtf Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about?
Uh, yeah? Socialism is a product or service provided by a government agency at a reduced or waived price. The products and services in question don’t just happen.
Jesse, what the fuck are you talking about?
Trying to explain the world economic state to the extremists on both sides of the political spectrum. Because they don’t seem to understand mass media lied about the definitions of various political ideologies. Sush.
Socialism is an economic system defined by production of goods and services according to their need, in contrast to capitalism where they’re produced for profit. Two totally different, incompatible systems
Okay, then I’m willing to admit fault but… Which is it? Worker control of production, or production according to need?
Or are you honestly going to tell me you think Collectivism (worker control of government and economy) or Communism (according to need and with no profit-making allowed) are the only forms that socialism takes?
Not saying you’re wrong, only that conflicting definitions do not help your cases, Cynetri and GreenTeaRedFlag.
Honestly, why not just peg the value of 100 of a a currency to the energy used to create a loaf of bread? Then bread will always cost close to 100 and other products will be priced according to energy and not speculation. The recipe would need to be standardized and compared but not automatically equivocated to supermarket/bakery/homemade bread, and changing it once the hypothetical currency is live would not be an option, but you’re asking to replace the entire capitalist economy so I can only hope you understand a revolution doesn’t come without risk and has never truly succeeded yet for anyone ever.
Honestly, why not just peg the value of 100 of a a currency to the energy used to create a loaf of bread? Then bread will always cost close to 100 and other products will be priced according to energy and not speculation.
Markets aren’t that efficient compared to planning. There is a reason why firms nowadays work off of a bastardized descendent of Cybersyn.
but you’re asking to replace the entire capitalist economy so I can only hope you understand a revolution doesn’t come without risk and has never truly succeeded yet for anyone ever.
Tell that to Cubans, who had a longer life expectancy than people than the US even with the blockade before Trump intensified the blockade.
I just said, for anyone. Democracies included. This isn’t about who did what, it’s about how everyone has failed to create everlasting utopia and I’m sick of people assuming a given political system will ever fix any problem on its own.
That might work. Really it isn’t that hard. Most societies through history have practiced some form of social production. Without the fear and lie nation of capitlaism the desire to do good and not live in a bad place has been drive enough to make things work.
Uh, yeah? Socialism is a product or service provided by a government agency at a reduced or waived price. The products and services in question don’t just happen.
no it isn’t. socialism is worker control of the means of production.
Okay, then I’m willing to admit fault but… Which is it? Worker control of production, or production according to need?
Or are you honestly going to tell me you think Collectivism (worker control of government and economy) or Communism (according to need and with no profit-making allowed) are the only forms that socialism takes?
Not saying you’re wrong, only that conflicting definitions do not help your cases, Cynetri and GreenTeaRedFlag.
The historical reality is that the word’s meaning has changed over time and the meaning currently being used by GreenTeaRedFlag has also changed words. There used to be “social democrats” who would be more recognizable as Marxists nowadays and who bear little resemblance to what we call them nowadays.
That actually explains a lot, thank you. I’m just going to duck out now then since clearly I walked into a minefield of conflicting historical definitions.
That’s fair. For what it’s worth, I don’t know any socialist schools of thought which define socialism as equivalent to government social spending.
No need to reply since you’re ducking out, but if you don’t mind me offering a couple videos on the subject of central planning, these are well done and measured analyses in my opinion:
You are literally saying something that is so thoroughly absurd it is a well known meme used to make fun of people who don’t know what they’re talking about.
Look, ignorance is not a crime. But you really are painfully ignorant about the topic you are claiming to explain and you would do well to learn more before presuming to educate “extremists on both sides.” Your comments are so lacking in self awareness and so cringe that I’m half convinced this is a bit.
Edit: So after a refresh of the thread I read more of your comments and I’m glad to see you’re willing to learn and discuss. Here is another good introduction point that’s been well received by a lot of people beginning to look beyond the buzzwords and genuinely learn: www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpKsygbNLT4 Actually, the same could be said for about every video on that channel (Second Thought).
Also, how on earth is “Fuck cars” a successful “socialist experiment”? The biggest action anyone associated with that movement is flatten a few tires from SUV’s
socialism is when I listen to NPR. capitalism is when I go to my parent’s house for Christmas. communism is when I get to program the radio presets in mom’s Honda Odyssey. social democracy is when I go to Starbucks. liberalism is when I look through the LL Bean catalogue.
Interstate Highways and similar systems are “successful” socialism, as far as I understand socialism, because they are a piece of tax-funded infrastructure that has outlasted and avoided issues that have proven inherent to soviet-style, communist nation-states.
As far as I’ve ever been aware, socialism is the use of tax dollars to provide goods or services beyond simply the military protection provided by feudal governments.
socialism can be understood as the transitional state between a capitalist mode of production and a communist one. the US government is a 100% certified capitalist state, any project they have undertaken has nothing to do with socialism
Sorry mate, socialism isn’t that. Here’s a good place to start learning about what socialism is. check out Richard Wolff, a economics professor, on YouTube for some interesting lecturers about how it works in reality if you want to go a bit further.
Yeah, that’s definitely a usage of the word socialism I have heard, but it is not generally a definition most socialists or socialist parties would use and it has some issues in my opinion.
This is such a broad definition of socialism as to make it almost meaningless, as this definition fits every nation on earth today and most through history. ancient Rome used public money to fund public roads, subsidized grain for the poor, public entertainment and land grants for veterans, public aqueducts, and other public programs, yet this was 2000 years before the concept of socialism was really invented and I don’t think anyone is holding up ancient Rome as an example of a socialist society.
I would define socialism by two characteristics. One is control over the political economy by the proletariat (workers), as opposed to the bourgeoisie (capitalists/financiers/business owners). In a bourgeois run capitalist state, there is still publicly funded services, but they generally set up to benefit privately run industry (public highways, government subsidized research, police) or they are concessions won by the proletariat through class struggle (universal healthcare, social welfare programs).
The second characteristic is economic organization around common need, rather than around the pursuit of profits. This would require taking the means off production (factories, businesses, utilities, etc) out of the hands of the bourgeoisie.
I do use a monarch’s definition of democracy. Or rather, I use the worst things a type of government has done to define whether it meets its ideals. Communism disappeared people who criticized the leadership, democracy is a witch trial on a national scale, and monarchy is an asshole who has a private army running a protection racket.
As far as I’ve ever been aware, socialism is the use of tax dollars to provide goods or services
I’ve seen others comment but I’ll add my own two cents. You don’t know what socialism is, and that’s not a criticism of you, it’s just a fact.
What you’re describing is social democracy wherein governments allow a capitalist relationship to the means of production to exist while providing social programs and investing. Socialism and Capitalism are about the worker’s relationship to the means of production. Under capitalism Capitalists take money generated by worker’s surplus labor as profits and use these profits to create a government that will protect their power to continue stealing from their workers. Under socialism profits are not held privately but publicly, by worker’s or socialist governments that exist to redistribute the ill gotten wealth of the Capitalists.
It’s not about how many programs a government does or the taxes it collects, it’s about the workers relations to the means of production. The problem with social democracy, which Lenin pointed out over a hundred years ago in State and Revolution, is that by letting Capitalists exist they will not allow workers to take away their wealth and power democratically, they will use fascism to secure their wealth. Another problem is that these programs cannot exist for long because Capitalists are parasites and will do everything they can to privatize them and milk as much profit out of them as possible, for examples of this look at nearly every government program that exists in Europe and point to me one that works better now than it did 30 years ago before Capitalists had time to take cuts out of it, it’s a really big problem typically with healthcare programs in these countries.
“far as I understand socialism” We got a lot to unpack here.
Youbtalked about how all the post soviet states crumbled into disrepair. They are cpaitlaist. That is cpaitlaism. When they were not capitalist things got better. When they were cpaitlaist. Things got worse. This is basic stuff here.
Ever seen that chart of standard of living for the top 10% and bottom 40% of wealth in Russia since 1880?
I don’t remember where it was but I’ll explain.
1880 to the Soviet Union were completely unfair. 1990 to present was and is completely unfair. I am not going to argue in favor of capitalism because to capitalism I, specificly me as a person, am unprofitable. I would be killed in a cyberpunk dystopia.
During the Soviet Union, the standards of living were roughly equal, but dropped 66% below the standards of living the 10% experienced before and after.
According to a calculation, to reach a state of being secure from the climate crisis and have equal wealth, we would need to revert to the standard of living of 1960s America technologically.
I don’t like capitalism or hate socialism. I hate that the universe works in such a way that my lifestyle - no car, living with my parents, and writing on a modern computer with fiber internet access for a living, with no possessions individually worth more than $5000 and a net worth of basically zero - is not fair under capitalism AND impossible under the kind of world YOU want to live in.
You want to live in a world where my only niche in life is too luxurious for everyone else? Fuck you, I’ll just commit suicide.
There are lies, and then there are statistics, and trying to do living standard calculations about this shit with a 10% cutoff that’s including the feudal warlords who owned literally everything and were spending fuckoff amounts of money on fucking glass eggs is just dancing around the actual point here.
They went from a feudal partially industrialized backwater to space in the span of ~30 years, with a catastrophic war right in the middle. They operated for decades under siege from the rest of the world outside their relatively small and poor sphere.
I don’t like capitalism or hate socialism. I hate that the universe works in such a way that my lifestyle - no car, living with my parents, and writing on a modern computer with fiber internet access for a living, with no possessions individually worth more than $5000 and a net worth of basically zero - is not fair under capitalism AND impossible under the kind of world YOU want to live in.
You want to live in a world where my only niche in life is too luxurious for everyone else? Fuck you, I’ll just commit suicide.
Socialism is when no electronic treats? those devices you’re so protective of are almost definitely made in China or nearby already, what do you think the anti-China warmongering is going to result in if not a disruption of your treats?
your life sounds pretty miserable under capitalism, wild how we have a system which prioritizes the right of property owners to extract rents from people in perpetuity.
My life is miserable because I have a disability that means I have to rely on others and was literally been screwed out of a happy childhood by my own government from 2001-2002. I can barely trust my government to give me enough to live on (~$20,000 CAD a year), and full-bodied lasseiz-faire capitalism would view me as human vermin, while all attempts at communism has proven to be endemically-afflicted with an authoritarian existence that would have me exterminated as “useless”.
I’m not defending capitalism. I’m calling reality hell and calling each and every one of you my jailors for not giving a fuck how MY LIFE means NOTHING to you.
I never called any of YOU worthless or lazy or genetically substandard. You all seem to have no thought towards what happens to the people who will die when you revolt because they are TERMINALLY DEPENDENT on the status quo, nor do you care that history has shown over and over and FUCKING over that regardless of what type of government or economy you choose, revolutions ALWAYS fail.
I’m trying to say, this isn’t about a fucking political compass to me, and I don’t have a position on that compass. This is about how EVERYONE has fucking rejected me except my closest family and friends, and now I hate all of you equally regardless of your position because you insist I pick a goddamn side when no matter who wins, I DIE. So why SHOULDN’T I say that capitalism is evil, and communism is evil, and socialism is evil, and anarchy and monarchy and fascism and everything else we’ve EVER used to structure a society is EVIL, because IT DOESN’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT COLLATERAL DAMAGE.
You want a fucking flame war? How about I fucking dox you all and steal a car to drive haphazardly to all of your houses and BURN THEM TO THE FUCKING GROUND?! No, I’m not serious, but THAT is what your political opinions are threatening to do to my life; take the few things that matter to me away and then leave me to die, or hunt me down and have me tortured until I break or die from the stress.
Fuck you. I own a computer, I have a bedroom, I play video games and read ebooks. That’s all that I can afford, and you think I should give up everything except the bedroom. How about all of you give up your cars, transit passes, televisions, motorhomes, ATVs, boats, private schools, swimming pools, summer camps, vacations to ANYWHERE, IoT devices, smartphones, model train sets, gym memberships, single family homes, college educations, going out to restaurants at your own expense, collections of trading cards or china plates or beanie babies, keeping pets, having children, working a job that you like, working a job you are psychologically capable of doing, AND never owning anything expensive that you just think looks neat? Because I have none of those other things, and you expect me to give up my computer for your own benefit as much as the wealthy assholes do.
I’m trying to say, this isn’t about a fucking political compass to me, and I don’t have a position on that compass.
The compass shit is bullshit anyways
revolutions ALWAYS fail.
They have succeeded in the past, and it was often disabled people fighting the hardest for socialist revolution- because the status quo was killing them. Helen keller was a socialist.
My life is miserable because I have a disability that means I have to rely on others and was literally been screwed out of a happy childhood by my own government from 2001-2002. I can barely trust my government to give me enough to live on (~$20,000 CAD a year), and full-bodied lasseiz-faire capitalism would view me as human vermin, while all attempts at communism has proven to be endemically-afflicted with an authoritarian existence that would have me exterminated as “useless”.
You are in full-bodied capitalism, it’s just that it’s the people outside your national borders who are the ‘human vermin’ getting exterminated by your countries military, along with its allies. You get some meager existence in the meantime and lots of treats to enjoy.
You seem pretty worked up about this, but don’t seem to have an understanding of what socialists even want. You also don’t seem interested in learning.
I work with people who are unhoused living on the streets with far less toys than you have, I’ve know many people that didn’t make it through the last few years. You can eat my shit and hair.
2, tell me if the USA is going to last another 20 years because I doubt it. Now tell me if your fucking revolution’s results will still be around in 248 years. ALL political systems are doomed to fail, so LEAVE MY LIFE THE FUCK ALONE.
3, trying to guilt me into giving up what little I do have through whataboutism makes you look like an asshole.
I’ve never murdered a person. If that’s what you think of me through no fault of my own, maybe - regardless of your skin color - I should make you the first?
I’m fucking done. Choke on my fucking cock, you goddamn hypocritical woke-ass bitch.
You are in full-bodied capitalism, it’s just that it’s the people outside your national borders who are the ‘human vermin’ getting exterminated by your countries military, along with its allies.
I never said you murdered anyone, you are just on the side of the soul harvester where the goodies pop out
while all attempts at communism has proven to be endemically-afflicted with an authoritarian existence that would have me exterminated as “useless”.
This is completely false. Socialist states aren’t the ones doing eugenics and killing the disabled. That’s fascist and liberal states doing it (I’m sure you see how MAiD is sinister). Socialist states, while not always prioritizing the issue of disability, have sought to help the disabled so that they can help in the ways they can rather than waste away in a hovel as they were left to in feudal society.
Interstate Highways and similar systems are “successful” socialism, as far as I understand socialism
I must be blunt here: socialism is not about taxation. At all. Socialist communes don’t even require taxes or money to exist. Socialism is about workers’ relationship with work.
Even by you’d definition of “socialism” being public infrastructure spending, how is the US highway system more successful than the Chinese High Speed Rail system?
That might be why everyone’s probably assuming I’m right-wing. I mentioned it (the highway system) with its criticisms because, while successful at remaining operational, the Chinese high speed rail system is, by virtue of being a rail system, much more efficient. It would be better if there were low-speed rail connections too, but as it is the Chinese high speed rail system is indeed a successful socialist(?)/socially-funded(?) intercity transit system. OIf course, the Chinese rail system has flaws like lines that lose billions of tax dollars every year (or rather the important part is that this says there aren’t enough riders on those routes), but the Interstates were often built through areas in the middle of nowhere b ecause it made construction companies a shitload of money.
In short, you’re right to mention the chinese rail, “succesful” in my eyes also meant longevity along with a national scale and the highways happen to be older.
Lines losing money is implying that the point of the lines is to make money. That is so staggeringly uninformed and capitalist minded it blows me away.
I will shock you by informing you most fish are bad at flying.
The problem isn’t the money. Its that the money coming from fares doesn’t cover the track maintenance. Besides, my point is not the cost because you’re right on that part, but rather that…
The cost is probably due to lower ridership than needed to make the line useful rather than wasteful.
High speed rail lines are bad at low density nations/regions. So, like a fish in the air versus a panda in the air, neither rail lines nor highways actually function well in that situation, though highways are pretty crappy no matter what. The best solution is actually rural mechanization/electrification and an increase in urbanization, which - despite international impressions - has barely been done in China in favor of keeping the remaining impoverished people poor.
Believe me, I’m aware the money isn’t the point, I’m saying that if you institute a government, even a communist one, you shouldn’t completely ignore the currency someone has on hand or spends anymore than you should rely solely on the currency someone has or spends as the primary or only measure of their importance.
A penny versus a dollar should not define the people carrying them, but the person can usually influence the world using them, and whether you’re a selfish or benevolent bureaucrat, the ability to know what kind of influence a person is likely to exert is the entire reason we are having to discuss politics with a degree of edge in the first place; Our leadership has access to that information and STILL aren’t using it to fix things instead of filling their pockets, therefore each of us is unsatisfied. I think everyone who’s posed in this thread can at least agree on that, considering this is Lemmy.
My brother in Christ, China has urbanized faster than any society in human history. They build entire cities and then move people in once they’re finished.
The people pay to maintain the rails through taxes, failing to “recoup the maintenance” just means the lines are subsidized.
By that logic if they charged no fee to use them, it would be infinitely wasteful…
Which, by the way, have you noticed most highways are free to use? Does that not make them money losers?
So are parks, and sidewalks.
I’ve never seen them criticized as wasteful. The point is not to make money with them.
but as it is the Chinese high speed rail system is indeed a successful socialist(?)/socially-funded(?) intercity transit system.
It’s funny to call America’s highways socialist and then hedge your phrasing against China’s rail system.
More genuinely, would you like me to go through the Marxian conception of socialism in a non-combative way? It looks like you’re doing your best but just aren’t familiar with the topic.
Don’t bother friend. I know from long experience that they will insist on defining the terms of the discussion on their own, as if some whack job fringe theorist is somehow to be accorded the final word in adjudicating our use of language.
The problem therein is of course that when your opponent gets to set the parameters of meaning and discussion, you aren’t really exchanging ideas on an intellectually even playing field.
I’ve pointed this out many times over the years, but it still hasn’t taken with your true believers/idiots.
Long story short; don’t waste your time; you aren’t arguing with good-faith interlocutors.
They are playing semantic games and have no interest in honest discussion.
To them. You and I are simply uneducated morons who have yet to receive the true message.
Don’t bother friend. I know from long experience that they will insist on defining the terms of the discussion on their own, as if some whack job fringe theorist is somehow to be accorded the final word in adjudicating our use of language.
Ahh right, why should adherents of an ideology have any say in how that ideology is defined and how terminology specific to that ideology means?
The problem therein is of course that when your opponent gets to set the parameters of meaning and discussion
Your opponents shouldn’t get to set the definitions, but the opponents of socialism should get to set the definition of socialism. Makes sense.
you aren’t really exchanging ideas on an intellectually even playing field.
Correct, thought the intellectual disparity clearly cleaves in the opposite direction to what you believe.
Noted fringe theorists no one ever heard of Marx and Engels.
I’m sure people have tried to define basic terms like socialism to you because you’re politically illiterate. Thats not a scam to “define terms” to win an arguement it is a literal defining of terms, of actual words that you don’t know the meaning of
I acknowledge that ‘socialism’ is a vague term with dozens of definitions, but this strange strictly-American idea that publicly-funded infrastructure is socialist isn’t a useful definition, nor a common one. It will really just confuse people.
Historically and presently, socialism is a labour movement which, despite all the variations, had the common goal of the workers controlling their means of production, rather than the owning class. Almost every political dictionary and socialist will back that up, and also Wikipedia (for something we can check right now). It’s not about whether something is private or public.
Paying taxes and voting in a (systematically broken, throroughly corrupted) government representative democracy isn’t really accomplishing this. We are arill beholden to the owning capitalist class. How I spend my working hours is still governed by a bourgeois board of directors, I don’t own the tools I use, I don’t have meaningful power to make democratic decisions about my work or my society governance.
You are correct that socialism exists (present tense! see: Zapatistas) without planned economies. But if you want to see what socialist modes of organisation look like within capitalism, it would be a workers cooperative.
Anti-car movements are not socialist nor socialism. They are good and pro-society, but are completely incidental to the socialist movement.
Collectively-funded operations like roads, police and our military airstriking hospitals aren’t socialist nor socialism. We have no control over the use of our money and labour; even if voting was democratic power in practice, a campaigning platform isn’t a guarantee of policy, they can completely ignore that once elected. And also, no matter who you vote for, your tax money will still go towards anti-socialism!
As for the parts about communism, well, no. The definition you’ve invented wildly conflicts with both theory and historical events. You’re gonna have to start from scratch on that one, even just looking at the Wiki article will provide a much better base. Very popular ideologies like anarcho-communism just completely contradict all that.
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