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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Eric]
    #1180281 - 12/30/02 03:33 PM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Quote:

A workers state is hardly slavery, even with a stalinist beaurcracy, everyone has a place to live, food to eat, education..etc



History isn't one of your strong points is it? Why don't you read "The Gulag Archipelago" by Alexander Solzhenitsyn or talk to victims of the Soviet system. Your ignorance is astounding.


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

Edited by Evolving (12/30/02 03:33 PM)

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Eric]
    #1180329 - 12/30/02 04:11 PM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Eric, here are some thoughts from PEOPLE WHO HAVE LIVED UNDER COMMUNISM:

To coexist with communism on the same planet is impossible. Either it will spread, cancer-like, to destroy mankind, or else mankind will have to rid itself of communism (and even then face lengthy treatment for secondary tumors).
- Alexander Solzhenitsyn, "The Mortal Danger"

Nowhere on the planet, nowhere in history, was there a regime more vicious, more bloodthirsty, and at the same time more cunning than the Bolshevik, the self-styled Soviet regime.
- Alexander Solzhenitsyn, "Gulag Archipelago"

To reject this inhuman Communist ideology is simply to be a human being. Such a rejection is more than a political act. It is a protest of our souls against those who would have us forget the concepts of good and evil.
- Alexander Solzhenitsyn, "Warning to the West"

Because the regime is captive to its own lies, it must falsify everything. It falsifies the past. It falsifies the present, and it falsifies the future. It falsifies statistics. It pretends not to possess an omnipotent and unprincipled police apparatus. It pretends to respect human rights. It pretends to prosecute no one. It pretends to fear nothing. It pretends to pretend nothing.
- Vaclav Havel, "The Power of the Powerless" (1978)

My dear fellow citizens: For forty years you have heard from my predecessors on this day different variations of the same theme: how our country flourished, how many millions of tons of steel we produced, how happy we all were, how we trusted our government, and what bright perspectives were unfolding in front of us. I assume you did not propose me for this office so that I, too, would lie to you.
- Vaclav Havel, Address to the Czech and Slovak people, 1990.

The previous regime ... reduced man to a means of production and nature to a tool of production. Thus it attacked both their very essence and their mutual relationship. It reduced gifted and autonomous people to nuts and bolts in some monstrously huge, noisy, and stinking machine.
- Vaclav Havel, Address to the Czech and Slovak people, 1990.

We were happy a hundred years ago. We knew that there were exploiters and exploited, wealthy and poor, and we had a perfect idea of how to get rid of injustice; we would expropriate the owners and turn the wealth over to the common good. We expropriated the owners and we created one of the most monstrous and oppressive social systems in world history. And we keep repeating that "in principle everything was all right, only some unfortunate accidents slipped in and slightly spoiled the good idea. Now let us start afresh...."
- Leszek Kolakowski, "The Socialist Idea"

President Gorbachev gave us freedom of worship and freedom of speech and freedom to see what was going on and freedom to vote, but that freedom won't last unless it is underpinned by economic freedom.
- Boris Yeltsin

The social model of the Bolsheviks failed, as will any model that denies individual rights, intellectual freedom, and freedom of competing political parties. Without these freedoms and rights, there is no motivation for people to work. Such a system cannot be sustained, especially in light of the technological revolution of the information era.
- Mikhail Gorbachev, 1999.

The fundamental error of socialism is anthropological in nature. Socialism considers the individual person simply as an element, a molecule within the social organism, so that the good of the individual is completely subordinated to the functioning of the socio-economic mechanism. Socialism likewise maintains that the good of the individual can be realized without reference to his free choice, to the unique and exclusive responsibility which he exercises in the face of good or evil. Man is reduced to a series of social relationships, and the concept of the person as the autonomous subject of moral decisions disappears.

The modern business economy has positive aspects. Its basis is human freedom exercised in the economic field. There exists another form of ownership which is becoming no less important than land: the possession of know-how, technology and skill. The wealth of the industrialized nations is based much more on this kind of ownership than on natural resources. Besides the earth, man's principal resource is man himself. Where self-interest is suppressed, it is replaced by a burdensome system of bureaucratic control that dries up the wellsprings of initiative and creativity.

- Pope John Paul II, "Centesimus Annus"


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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InvisibleXlea321
Stranger
Registered: 02/25/01
Posts: 9,134
Re: Communism [Re: Evolving]
    #1180473 - 12/30/02 05:57 PM (21 years, 3 months ago)

None of those people lived under communism. The soviet state was devoted to destroying communism. Read up on the spanish civil war.


--------------------
Don't worry, B. Caapi

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181089 - 12/31/02 03:27 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

How come in the numerour places communism has been tried, the same sorry cry from the apologists is heard? Quit living in a fantasy world, THE REAL WORLD EFFECTS of the attempted implementation of communism are tyrrany and human suffering. It's time to stop living with utopian fantasies and face the facts. Communism is a flawed idealogy that ignores human nature and cannot be implemented without a dictatorship or tyranny of some sort. History teaches us more than the fantasy of marxist rhetoric.

How do you tell a Communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin.


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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InvisibleRandalFlagg
Stranger
Registered: 06/15/02
Posts: 15,608
Re: Communism [Re: Eric]
    #1181156 - 12/31/02 04:33 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)


You say that the police defends the interests and property of all the
people. But thats not really true, because people without property
cant exactly have their interests defended now can they?

People have their BODIES and PROPERTIES defended by laws and by the
police. For example, if a penniless homeless person gets killed,
the police still investigate the death. In America, a person's
economic situation has nothing to do with the applicability of
laws.

If a person has no property, and they wish to acquire some, they are
permitted to engage in any economic activity that they wish to in
order to gain the resources to purchase property.


A workers state is hardly slavery, even with a stalinist beaurcracy,
everyone has a place to live, food to eat, education..etc

People in a prison have a place to live, food to eat, health care,
and access to education. Do you think these people have freedom?

How can deny this simple fact: In a controlled economy all
resources and representations of effort are taken away from
individuals. By limiting economic freedom to ensure economic
equality, you will have to engage in economic tyranny.


Our polarized counterposed positions just goes to show that class
interests are irreconcilable, and while we currently live under the
dicatorship of the bourgeosie, you are no doubt very comfortable in
the world you live in.

Your ideological positions and reason are irreconcilable.

You know nothing of my situation. Here, I'll clue you in:
I completely support myself. I have about three hundred dollars
in savings. I don't own any property. I rent one side of a duplex,
and live right next to another family. But, overall I am fairly
financially stable as of now(I can pay the bills and feed myself).

But, it was not always like this. You know nothing of the hardships
that I have endured, and how dare you presume to. Do you know what
it is like to not have enough money to buy food, and therefore you
just don't eat? Do you know what it is like to not have the energy
to do anything because of lack of food? Do you know what it is like
to live off of Ramen noodles and tap water when you do get money?
Do you know what it is like not to be able to pay your bills? Do
you know what it is like to be faced with the stark possibility
of homelessness? I know what all of these things are like because
I have lived through them all. I have been dirt poor and desperate.
If there ever was a member of the "proletariat", I am it.

I have made my own way in this world. The things that have happened
in my life occurred because I put myself in those situations. I
have struggled and I have suffered. These tribulations have made
me a better person.

My struggles, my pain, and my failures are all a part of me. I have
learned from them and continue to learn from them. I gladly choose
freedom, and the perils that accompany it, over a security that
is marred by a dependent servitude.


Today, with the counterrevolutionary destruction of the Soviet Union,
the world is a much more dangerous place

The world is a much more dangerous place now that the Soviet
Union(which repeatedly engaged in aggressive actions against
other terroritories and governments) does not exist? You are
incapable of seeing the truth.


as the imperialists ride roughshed over the third world, determined
to assert their right to dominate and exploit.

You seem to love using your freedom of speech to espouse your ideas.
Yet, the people who live under communist rule around this world
do not enjoy that same freedom.

The communists of yore seemed determined to implement their ideas
upon all other people, regardless of whether these people agreed
to it or not.

I am able to, and I do, disagree with some of my country's past and
present actions. I can admit mistakes. It's funny how citizens
living under the present communist regimes can't express disagreement
with their countries policies. And, the regimes seem incapable of
admitting to mistakes.


the imperialist system must be destroyed from the
inside out, and this can only be done by the working class taking
power.

Do you really think that this "imperialist system" should be replaced
by an economic system that doesn't work(as history and my arguments
have proven)? Do you really think that this "imperialist system"
should be replaced by an ideology that promises the world, but that
has a consistent tendency to devolve into totalitarianism?


You claim that imperialist interventions were done in order to
counter "communist aggression"?

Yes, most of them were.


How was the election of Salvador Allande in Chile communist
aggression?

I am not knowledgable of that situation. Please don't tell me
about it, because your version will be hopelessly biased.


The CIA attempted 10 times to assasinate Castro!

The Soviets were trying to use Cuba as a launching pad to
have first strike capability against America. Do you remember when
the Soviets put those missiles(which were to be aimed at America)
on Cuba? Castro was a serious threat. He was the servant of an
enemy that had pledged to destroy us.


And Russia was invaded by imperialist powers after the 1917 revolution!

Am I missing something here....I never heard of Russia being
militarily invaded by America, Britian, or Canada.


Stalin did his job for the imperialists (the imperialists nonetheless
were determined to smash the stalinist workers state) by selling out
revolutions in China, Spain...etc with the ideology of "socialism in
one country".

Stalin didn't do anything for anybody but himself. All he cared
about was his own power.

If communism was going to work in any country, it should have been
the Soviet Union. Their vast natural resources afforded them the
ability to provide for all of their citizens. Yet, they weren't able
to. And, let me add that even if they WERE able to, it would still
be dehumanizing to live under economic tyranny, even if they did have
access to material comfort(which they didn't).


RandalFlagg


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InvisibleXlea321
Stranger
Registered: 02/25/01
Posts: 9,134
Re: Communism [Re: Evolving]
    #1181201 - 12/31/02 05:16 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

How come in the numerour places communism has been tried

A dictatorship is a dictatorship. Nothing to do with communism. The soviets helped crush communism in the spanish civil war, where incidentally it was working just fine.

Calling a sheep a lama doesn't make it so. A dictatorship isn't "trying communism", it's the exact opposite of trying communism.


--------------------
Don't worry, B. Caapi

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InvisibleXlea321
Stranger
Registered: 02/25/01
Posts: 9,134
Re: Communism [Re: RandalFlagg]
    #1181222 - 12/31/02 05:30 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

The Soviets were trying to use Cuba as a launching pad

Come on, they were trying to assasinate castro long before the missile crisis. The main reason the russians put the missiles there was because it was obvious the US were about to invade cuba again.

Yet, the people who live under communist rule around this world

I think you're referring to people who live under dictatorships. What does a dictatorship have to do with communism?

by an economic system that doesn't work(as history and my arguments

Actually it works pretty damn well. Look at Russia going from a feudalist state to a superpower in 30 years despite bearing the brunt of the most catastrophic war in human history. That's pretty good going. It's why third world countries find the communist model attractive - it works. Looking at places where the free market experiment has been tried there's been nothing but utter disaster. Indonesia and Argentina - the two stars of the free market philosophy are in utter chaos and are an unmitigated economic disaster thanks to capitalism.

I am not knowledgable of that situation

Allende is a very good one to study. A guy who won an election fair and square and set about improving the lives of his people. He wasn't friendly to US corporations so he had to go. The US thug Pinochet replaced him - his secret police's specialty was training german shepherd dogs to rip women and children apart. Charming guy.

I never heard of Russia being invaded

Yep, it's true.

Their vast natural resources afforded them the

Remember most of it is under 10 feet of snow. America has far more accessible resources and growing land. Communism would work fine in America - indeed the new deal of Roosevelt was a very communist style idea that saved America from the disastrous free-market philosophy that had led it straight into the disaster of 1929. Giving people a fair wage and fair working conditions never dehumanised anybody.


--------------------
Don't worry, B. Caapi

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OfflineEric
journeyman
Registered: 12/28/02
Posts: 61
Last seen: 19 years, 9 months
Re: Communism [Re: RandalFlagg]
    #1181249 - 12/31/02 05:47 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

RandalFlagg

You accuse me of bias, yet you are completely biased yourself. Go read up on a history of Chile if you dont want my version. Actually theres a nice little movie about it made Paramount pictures i believe....called "Missing".

Missles in Cuba? And the United States did not have missles in Turkey then?
Talk about biases! You are hypocritical in that you said (check previous post) that you agree that countries like the US should not meddle with the business and affairs of others, yet that is exactly what the imperialists have to do in order to keep their system alive. I say the world is a more dangerous place now that the USSR is gone because now the imperialists are able to enter any country they want with little or no military counterweight to it.

Alex123 is right when he says that Stalin sold out the Spanish revolution, and the Chinese revolution of 1923... Stalin was preferable to the imperialists because he did his job for them by keeping communism confined within the boundaries of the USSR. In fact, the imperialists did not formally recognize the USSR until stalin came to power!

Stalin said once (and i might have the quote wrong) "We dont want an inch of your land, and but we wont give up an inch of ours" (to the imperialists). Trotsky argued against this by saying "as if this is a question of territory, and not one of two irreconcilable systems!"

By betraying the revolution, and principles of proletariet internationalism, Stalin held back the communist movement, and eventually became a gravedigger for the USSR.

Evolving,
I hardly consider anyone that posts a quote from the pope worth arguing with.

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InvisibleXlea321
Stranger
Registered: 02/25/01
Posts: 9,134
Re: Communism [Re: Eric]
    #1181401 - 12/31/02 07:05 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Missles in Cuba? And the United States did not have missles in Turkey then?

Good point Eric.


--------------------
Don't worry, B. Caapi

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Eric]
    #1181412 - 12/31/02 07:07 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Quote:

I hardly consider anyone that posts a quote from the pope worth arguing with.



As I expected from someone who has a religous fervor for a utopian ideal, someone from a different religion (Christianity) cannot normally sway the true believer in a competing dogma.

What you are saying in essence, is that you are unable to refute the experiences and opinions of those who have lived under a system which you champion, of people who are much more knowledgeable than you on the subject. Thank you for your illuminating reply.


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181476 - 12/31/02 07:39 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Quote:

How come in the numerour places communism has been tried

A dictatorship is a dictatorship. Nothing to do with communism. The soviets helped crush communism in the spanish civil war, where incidentally it was working just fine.

Calling a sheep a lama doesn't make it so. A dictatorship isn't "trying communism", it's the exact opposite of trying communism.



I will repeat some other words which your mind seems to have missed. THE REAL WORLD EFFECTS of the attempted implementation of communism are tyranny and human suffering.

How many more people must die under failed attempts at coerced utopias? How much more human suffering must be endured at the hands of elitists who would force their misguided versions of paradise upon the masses of compliant humanity? What arrogance consumes the souls of those who think they know best how to hammer a society of individuals into a bland putty for 'the common good' causing them to endure their egotistical experiments in social engineering?

Human nature being what it is, people will generally attempt to expend the least effort necessary to get what they need or want, therein lies the inherent problem plaguing the communist fantasy. There never has been and there never will be an industrial or technological society that can flourish under the yoke of communism. Any such society will wither away as mediocrity and slothfulness get full support from those who are the producers and innovators while their personal initiative and hard work brings them only as much as those who would live off the efforts of others.


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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InvisibleXlea321
Stranger
Registered: 02/25/01
Posts: 9,134
Re: Communism [Re: Evolving]
    #1181514 - 12/31/02 07:57 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

attempted implementation of communism are tyranny and human suffering

Once again, you do not "attempt communism" and somehow end up with dictatorship. That's like saying you attempted to eat a hot dog but ate ice-cream instead. That doesn't mean hot-dogs cannot be eaten.

Emma Goldman was telling Lenin that the Bolsheviks had nothing to do with communism as early as 1920.


--------------------
Don't worry, B. Caapi

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181533 - 12/31/02 08:07 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Quote:

Look at Russia going from a feudalist state to a superpower in 30 years despite bearing the brunt of the most catastrophic war in human history.



Ha ha ha ha, care to compare it to Japan? Russia sucked reasources from other countries it controlled and the Soveit Union eventually collapsed from it's own economic inefficiencies. That's not a very convincing example.

Quote:

Looking at places where the free market experiment has been tried there's been nothing but utter disaster. Indonesia and Argentina - the two stars of the free market philosophy



Calling a sloth a racehorse and then using that as an example that racehorses can't run faster than dogs is some sloppy reasoning. Indonesia and Argentina hardly qualify as true free market countries. A much better comparison of a free-market vs. communist economy would be Hong Kong under the British vs. Communist China (before the free-market reforms).


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181545 - 12/31/02 08:12 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Quote:

Once again, you do not "attempt communism" and somehow end up with dictatorship. That's like saying you attempted to eat a hot dog but ate ice-cream instead. That doesn't mean hot-dogs cannot be eaten.



Okay, how do you implement communism when there are people who will resist it's implementation? One word, FORCE. I'm referring to the real world Alex, not some marxist fantasy.


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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InvisibleXlea321
Stranger
Registered: 02/25/01
Posts: 9,134
Re: Communism [Re: Evolving]
    #1181559 - 12/31/02 08:19 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

care to compare it to Japan?

Actually Japan was the one country that resisted influence from the west. Look at the surrounding countries where western model was followed and they're an absolute disaster. Japan is about as far away from sweatshop capitalism as it's possible to get. That's why it developed.

Soveit Union eventually collapsed from it's own economic inefficiencies

Not really. The soviet collapse had more to do with the general economic collapse of the 1980's, many other capitalist countries also suffered economic collapse's.

Indonesia and Argentina hardly qualify as true free market countries.

The world bank was running their economies almost 100%. You don't get more free market than that.


--------------------
Don't worry, B. Caapi

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InvisibleRandalFlagg
Stranger
Registered: 06/15/02
Posts: 15,608
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181656 - 12/31/02 09:17 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)


This message is directed towards Alex123 and Eric:


This debate of ours is bordering on redundancy. I will try to sum up
my feelings.

1. As far as the past actions of communist and capitalist countries,
I will say the following: We could spout examples of "imperialist"
and "communist" misconduct all day long. Let's just admit that both
the western capitalist democracies, and the communist regimes, have
done some shitty stuff.

2. I don't think communism can work. I have repeatedly said why
I don't think it can work. There is no point in repeating my
supporting arguments.

3. Even if communism could work, I would not want to live under it.

I am a person of limited financial means. I do not own property,
nor do I have a significant amount of money. According to communist
theory, I am a member of the proletariat. I am just the kind of
person who would financially benefit from the redistribution
of wealth.

It is noble to be concerned about the ills of humanity, but your
cure does not interest me. Will I ever commit theft against people
because they happen to have more than I do? Never. Will I ever
give up my aspirations for the sake of equality with my fellow man?
Never. Will I ever trade my freedom of action for an attitude of
forced altruism? Never.

I do not subsribe to your vision of the world, and I would rather die
than to live under it.


RandalFlagg

Edited by RandalFlagg (12/31/02 09:38 AM)

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
Two inch dick..but it spins!?
 User Gallery


Registered: 11/29/01
Posts: 34,247
Loc: Lost In Space
Re: Communism [Re: RandalFlagg]
    #1181659 - 12/31/02 09:21 AM (21 years, 3 months ago)

Bravo. Well said and a nice summation.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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InvisibleEvolving
Resident Cynic

Registered: 10/01/02
Posts: 5,385
Loc: Apt #6, The Village
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181684 - 12/31/02 09:40 AM (21 years, 2 months ago)

Quote:

Actually Japan was the one country that resisted influence from the west. Look at the surrounding countries where western model was followed and they're an absolute disaster. Japan is about as far away from sweatshop capitalism as it's possible to get. That's why it developed



Huh? I guess you are not familiar with the history of the U.S. occupation of Japan after WWII and the changes put in place by McArthur and the U.S. government. Now, you change the argument from free-market vs. Soviet Economy to 'sweatshop capitalism,' a silly nebulous term in an attempt to avoid critically examining your own assertions.

Quote:

Soveit Union eventually collapsed from it's own economic inefficiencies
Not really. The soviet collapse had more to do with the general economic collapse of the 1980's, many other capitalist countries also suffered economic collapse's



If ignorance is bliss, you must be the happiest man on earth.

Quote:

Indonesia and Argentina hardly qualify as true free market countries.
The world bank was running their economies almost 100%. You don't get more free market than that.



THE WORLD BANK IS NOT A FREE MARKET INSTITUTION. Loans being underwritten by taxpayers is not a free market activity. Banks loaning money to governments to prop them up is not a free market activity. Next you'll be telling us that the Soviet Union was a free-market institution.


--------------------
To call humans 'rational beings' does injustice to the term, 'rational.'  Humans are capable of rational thought, but it is not their essence.  Humans are animals, beasts with complex brains.  Humans, more often than not, utilize their cerebrum to rationalize what their primal instincts, their preconceived notions, and their emotional desires have presented as goals - humans are rationalizing beings.

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OfflinePhred
Fred's son
Male

Registered: 10/18/00
Posts: 12,949
Loc: Dominican Republic
Last seen: 9 years, 2 months
Re: Communism [Re: Xlea321]
    #1181819 - 12/31/02 11:58 AM (21 years, 2 months ago)

Alex123 writes:

Once again, you do not "attempt communism" and somehow end up with dictatorship.

Actually, you do. It cannot be otherwise. It matters not if it is the dictatorship of Stalin or the dictatorship of the Politburo or the dictatorship of the "proletariat"... Communism is impossible to implement in practice (except in relatively small groups of like-minded individuals) without forcefully violating the rights of those within the Communist society. Those who make the decisions as to whose rights are to be forcefully violated to what extent on any given day are the dictators.

Any time the dictators slacken their grip, human nature reasserts itself and black markets (capitalism) appear. The black markets provide what the Communists can't, and allow the nominally Communist regime to totter on for a few more years.

pinky


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OfflineEric
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Re: Communism [Re: RandalFlagg]
    #1182624 - 01/01/03 07:19 AM (21 years, 2 months ago)

RandalFlagg,

You finally make this minor concession that there is such thing as imperialist agression, but where this ends is where you compare the attrocities of the imperialists to that of communists, which is grotesque and sick.

The workers states, though their stalinist regimes ruled pretty badly without any system of workers democracy, the worker states were not the ones that murdered 3 million Koreans, they were not the ones that dropped 2 nuclear weapons to incinerate japanese civilians, they were not the ones that dropped napalm and agent orange in vietnam, they were not the ones that fueled the fire of islamic extremism and torture to afghan women (leading to Sept. 11), they did not start war against iraq, or war with Panama for economic gains and control. How can you make such a comparison?

You only make this concession by your inability to argue these points, by this position the best you can do to defend the imperialists is to equate them with the communists.

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