Communist Views

[chickendude]

Re: Communist Views

It's not people being greedy that prevent them from working to their full potential.
It's the lack of motivation.
There is no motivation like competition, which is what capitalism induces.
People will only push themselves to their limits with a great enough motivation; and "to help everyone" just doesn't cut it. All the smart, hard working people would only work as hard as the lazy ones, making the lazy ones lazier, snowballing into one giant inefficient pile-of-crap economy.

How could you motivate people to work in a communist society without a stalin-esque rule?

[AasumDude]

Re: Communist Views

Mankind is too greedy to allow such a system to work. Therefore, Communism could never hold out. Believing that you are the superior race just gets people pissed at you. So Fascism, in a way, would fall the same way as Communism because mankind is too greedy and wants to become the best just like in Communism. Except Fascism is taking control over other races to prove that you're superior. Communism equally distributes people's power and everyone gets the same. So obvoiusly people want to become the best and want to be the dominant race. So there will always be wars over them and they can never work. So both fail.

I see what you're trying to say (I think). Are you saying that Fascists are more external in showing their power and force, whereas Communism has an internal way of overpowering citizens?

Benny1: If 100 families refuse to work, and the government shoots one family and drags them into the street, then you have 99 families that are willing to work out of fear. Human will can be excellerated with the possibility of death. Doesn't killing a few members of the working class to fuel the rest of the proletariat into working understandable in this case?

Just to toss it up, I'd also like to mention that Stalin gave his officers as many as 4 cars per family while villagers were so hungry they had to kidnap children just to eat them. Oppinions?

[chickendude]

Re: Communist Views

so basically,
you have to rule like Stalin to make communism work

oh and cars in the Soviet Union did NOT work
they fell apart quickly. The USSR made shoddy products.

[Benny1]

Re: Communist Views

But is that really true communism?

True communism everybody is supposed to do their very best with no motivation at all, and tehre won't be a government to shoot people.

[chickendude]

Re: Communist Views

which is its main flaw

people don't do their best without motivation

If you were told that you will succeed in life whether you do well in school or not, you wouldn't stay up late finishing a project due the next day. You just wouldn't work hard in general.

[AasumDude]

Re: Communist Views

so basically,
you have to rule like Stalin to make communism work

Not exactly what I mean. Every Dictator of the Proletariat has done it... Mao killed more than 50 million during the Great Leap... and the cars weren't Russian made, most likely... what were you basing that assumption on?

And guys, I disagree... "do work or you'll get shot" is probably the most effective encouragement to working there is.

[chickendude]

Re: Communist Views

I disagree aasumdude

it makes people LOOK like they're working hard
thats why the cars were shoddy

you're given some metal and told to make 200,000 cars
you realize you can only make 150,000 cars with this metal
what do you do? You make 200,000 cars, each with 3/4 the metal. Weak and likely to fall apart.

The only way to inspire real hard work is for personal benefit. Car companies make GOOD cars because they themselves get the money when it is purchased.

also, Soviet Union didn't really import goods. They made their own crap. And it was crap.

[Charlotte21]

Re: Communist Views

But is that really true communism?

True communism everybody is supposed to do their very best with no motivation at all, and tehre won't be a government to shoot people.

True democracy is the people making all the decisions. I would say that no government operates under a system of true democracy. True democracy is mob rule.

[AasumDude]

Re: Communist Views

I disagree aasumdude

it makes people LOOK like they're working hard
thats why the cars were shoddy

you're given some metal and told to make 200,000 cars
you realize you can only make 150,000 cars with this metal
what do you do? You make 200,000 cars, each with 3/4 the metal. Weak and likely to fall apart.

The only way to inspire real hard work is for personal benefit. Car companies make GOOD cars because they themselves get the money when it is purchased.

also, Soviet Union didn't really import goods. They made their own crap. And it was crap.

It's not worth the risk... if you were found not working, you'd die. If you couldn't meet your quota, you'd die. If you didn't produce enough goods, your village for burned to the ground.

Soviet goods were not bad. The GDP of the Soviet Union was almost as high as America, and it was the second most powerful nation in the world besides the USA.

[The_Q]

Re: Communist Views

Well, there's nothing quite like coming back to the wonderful smell of commie bashing. So that's just what I'll do.

Communists are, quite frankly, wrong. All communism will ever do is harbor hatred among humans. Having someone take your personal property at your own expense because you're not utilizing it to the fullest just makes things worse. When you work hard every day only to see your earnings divided up among your comrades and are forced to trust that they will do the same to protect you. This is the first seed of distrust among men, the first sign that things might go wrong. The very fact that everyone is forced into the same condition stifles all creativity, all desire for advancement and any thought on how to get further. There is no incentive to do anything but the minimum.

Mind you, robots would run communism beautifully. They'd not take control of one another, they'd all pool things in and take out from the pool evenly without tensions or hurt feelings.

Laissez-faire, however, runs on the principle of selfishness and that is a good thing. Adam Smith, the original economic philosophe once wrote that "it is not of the benevolence of the butcher or the baker or the brewer that your get your dinner every evening." With every individual looking out for themselves, the market (and the society as a whole) becomes better off. Laissez-faire forces everyone to throw aside their differences and opinions and even prejudices to do business with one another as efficiently as possible. It is the easiest, most efficient and most beautiful form of economic genius man has ever so much as stumbled upon. To be able to decide which can of beans is better to buy without having a massive bureaucracy looking over my shoulder is rewarding simply because I get what I want. Prices are determined not by a lumbering beast of a government but the wants and needs, even the weather or transportational conditions, of the producers. One change in the weather in a mine in Australia will change the price of the little ends of erasers by about a cent and everyone in the industry will get that message and compensate WITHOUT GETTING A MEMO. Tell me that is not amazing. Not to mention, there is no "ripping off" in capitalism. If you feel you got "ripped off" in a purchase, but you still bought it, revealed preference shows that you still value the good at more than what you paid for it. Communism can't claim that.

Sure, it would be nice if we could all get along with one another and work together. That is why I say compete! Working against one another brings you closer! It breeds trust and compassion and even philanthropy (how many things are named after Rockefeller).

Off topic, I stand with Thomas Jefferson in saying that "the best government is the one that governs least." To restrict the market excessively is a crime. But it does need to be there for certain things (protection of certain rights).

Q

[Hollus]

Re: Communist Views

Has anyone heard of a game called "Prisoner's Dillemia"? Basically, you have two players who can either chose to "Cooperate" or "Betray". For example, if both players choose to "cooperate", lets say they both get $300. If one player chooses "cooperate" but the other player "betrays", the betrayer gets $500 and the cooperator gets nothing. This is a very basic description as it can get very complicated.

What I'm just saying it that even if the two players can maximize their combined total by choosing "cooperate" each turn, they will choose "betray", just to maximize their personal benefit at the expense of the other player. And since they are each trying to exploit one another, they will end up will will a significantly reduced sum at the end, because two players choosing "betray" only has a meager reward, such as $100.

In a perfect communist example, this would never happen, but the world isn't perfect. Even if greed can produce competition which can make us geniuses at times, greed sure can make us stupid too.

[devonin]

Re: Communist Views

So...you bumped a year old thread, to contribute nothing to the thread that has any bearing on the content?

I'll also point out that glancing over the thread, my good god does everyone have an inaccurate picture of how communism is supposed to work...makes me sad that many people's statements are prefaced with "I learned this in school"

[AquaTeen]

Re: Communist Views

When Karl Marx wrote the "Communist's Manifesto," His point of view on Communism was that it would make the government less corrupt but in my opinion it makes it more corrupt. I mean look at the rise of Totalitarianism which branched out of Communism. It makes the government more in control and it allows the government to rule over the people using fear. I believe that Capitalism is a better form of government and it's less corrupt.

[devonin]

Re: Communist Views

Except that Marx never intended for a government to just decide "Okay, we're communist now" and pretty much no "communist" state ever actually practiced communism remotely how it was supposed to be done according to Marx.

About the closest a true communist state has ever come to existing is Cuba.

Marx's intention was to spell out the aftereffects of the inevitable collapse of capitalism. No system based on infinite growth can possibly continue forever. Infinite growth is a myth given finite resources. Eventually, capitalism will come up against that hard cap, and fall apart. That's the time in which Marx supposes the rise of the proletariat and the seizing of the means of production.

[Cavernio]

Re: Communist Views

Instead of opening "I learned about communism and capitalism in school", I'm opening with "I don't truly know what communism or facism is, and I think I live in capitalism, and I've never studied either".

What has been mentioned a lot against communism is that it takes away one's motivation to work. Also said is that it tries to make everyone equal. Now, as I said, I don't the definition of communism specifically, but I know I have communist ideals, and I wouldn't hold them if I thought that the above statements were necessarily true.

Just because money and goods would not be used for motivation, doesn't mean that motivation to try and succeed would disapper. Right now, even in North America's capitalism, there's plenty of other motivation to work. There's respect, from yourself and others, social status, personal enjoyment, helping others, etc. I am not creative because I make money to do so. I don't post here because it looks good on my resume. I don't understand how my creativity would be stifled if I were not able to get more stuff than my neighbour. And this just isn't me. In fact, that people still join sports teams, play games, post on forums, etc., despite the fact that these activities can COST them money, shows that fun things that people like to do, which most certainly are good for society and the individual, will only increase when people don't have to worry about things like making minimum wage. I will concede that perhaps we'd be less productive, overall. But we'd probably be happier. As I've said before, capitalism seems like a trick to make us do things we don't want to do.

"When you work hard every day only to see your earnings divided up among your comrades and are forced to trust that they will do the same to protect you. This is the first seed of distrust among men, the first sign that things might go wrong."
And this is why law would still be necessary, and also why in order for the society to work well, you'd need strong societal values, and a belief in your government. And in response to your problem with communism, there's problems with capitalism. When you work hard everday, and see you're only getting 8$/hour, it makes you disheartened and bitter at the thought that someone above you, who's work is just as important to the running of whatever industry you're in, gets paid 10x as much.

Personally, I actually don't like owning much stuff. I don't have a collection of anything. For instance, if I read a book, that's all I want to do with it, even though it's good. I give it to someone else to read. I don't own any movies or TV series...why have them sit around my living room, showing them off, if I will watch them once, maybe twice, when I can get them on the internet or the video store? I don't own a house, and don't want to own a house. It means that I've got a huge financial responsibility, and that I'm tied down to living in one place. There are very few things which I in fact want to own. Even furniture and furnishings I wouldn't mind not being my own. Clothes, toiletries, my computer, physical art (of the non-digital kind), and items of emotional significance (like family heirlooms) are about the only things I really care about. Heck, I don't even care about my physical computer, just the files on it.

"One change in the weather in a mine in Australia will change the price of the little ends of erasers by about a cent and everyone in the industry will get that message and compensate WITHOUT GETTING A MEMO."
Maybe I'm not thinking things through enough, or my lack of education about communism is clearly showing, but why would something like this have to change with communism?

Devonin: "No system based on infinite growth can possibly continue forever. Infinite growth is a myth given finite resources." We don't have 'infinite' brainpower, but we certainly have a lot. It also helps that we build upon what we've previously known. People create when we have the opportunity, and that creativity can be shared. Plus, we have a whole universe of resources. We will have growth until the extinction of our species.