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You are aware that "the state" isn't a thing, right? "The State" is merely what we call what you're referring to as the workers if it doesn't do what we want it
by Godel_unicode 9y ago
You are aware that "the state" isn't a thing, right? "The State" is merely what we call what you're referring to as the workers if it doesn't do what we want it to. The State is just a group of people.
This type of revisionist romanticism towards the USSR is an excellent example of the No True Scotsman fallacy. We don't like the result, therefore it wasn't socialism.
- forinti 9y agoPeople have this knee-jerk reaction when you point out similarities between the USSR and capitalist economies, as if they had to be opposites in every dimension of life. Being a worker in a capitalist society (be it a democracy or not) and in the USSR meant, in both cases, that you didn't have much of a say in how your job went. Corporations are not democracies. And if you live in a society in which you don't really have a say or much control, you can't really expect people to care. And this is what my interpretation of TaylorAlexander's argument is. It is also why I think it would only make sense to investigate this matter further if we looked into societies that are different in this respect. Do the Amish take care of each other's stuff better? I don't know, but I would guess so.
- TaylorAlexander 9y ago"The State" exists as much as "Google" or "Microsoft" does. Either of them is run by specific people and has specific interests. And I believe it is generally fruitful to look at an organization of living organisms as a thing in its own right.