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The thing I see failing within socialism is individual work effort--everyone comes to believe that work is someone else's deal and not theirs or they become dis

The thing I see failing within socialism is individual work effort--everyone comes to believe that work is someone else's deal and not theirs or they become discouraged by the high taxes and simply go Gault. Then the crackdowns begin, further eroding morale until everyone is just beaten down, poor, and decrepit in body and spirit. Then they are ruled over with an iron fist. Marxism is the bane of humanity--the ultimate promise of something for nothing which is the biggest lie ever told.

ue_ 9y ago
>The thing I see failing within socialism is individual work effort--everyone comes to believe that work is someone else's deal and not theirs Socialism isn't about having other people work for you, it is about bringing about the necessary conditions such that the average amount of work per person required in society is reduced by eliminating what Marx terms 'contradictions' which are inherent in the capitalist mode of production. Nor do I believe it is about high taxes, or any taxes at all - in fact a key component of Socialism is the withering away of the state as the functions are either abandoned for not fitting material conditions or transferred to the proletariat. >Marxism is the bane of humanity--the ultimate promise of something for nothing which is the biggest lie ever told. I don't think that's true at all, and it's a gross misrepresentation that a Socialist society is a "promise of something for nothing". There are a great many people who would benefit by the kind of labour-saving optimisations that a Socialist mode of production introduces, especially those who put in something and get very close to nothing. As Russian anarcho-Communist Kropotkin said in The Conquest of Bread: >In virtue of this monstrous system, the son of the worker, on entering life, finds no field which he may till, no machine which he may tend, no mine in which he may dig, without accepting to leave a great part of what he will produce to a master. He must sell his labour for a scant and uncertain wage. His father and his grandfather have toiled to drain this field, to build this mill, to perfect this machine. They gave to the work the full measure of their strength, and what more could they give? But their heir comes into the world poorer than the lowest savage. If he obtains leave to till the fields, it is on condition of surrendering a quarter of the produce to his master, and another quarter to the government and the middlemen. And this tax, levied upon him by the State, the capitalist, the lord of the manor, and the middleman, is always increasing; it rarely leaves him the power to improve his system of culture. If he turns to industry, he is allowed to work — though not always even that — only on condition that he yield a half or two-thirds of the product to him whom the land recognizes as the owner of the machine.

ue_ 9y ago

>The thing I see failing within socialism is individual work effort--everyone comes to believe that work is someone else's deal and not theirs Socialism isn't about having other people work for you, it is about bringing about the necessary conditions such that the average amount of work per person required in society is reduced by eliminating what Marx terms 'contradictions' which are inherent in the capitalist mode of production. Nor do I believe it is about high taxes, or any taxes at all - in fact a key component of Socialism is the withering away of the state as the functions are either abandoned for not fitting material conditions or transferred to the proletariat. >Marxism is the bane of humanity--the ultimate promise of something for nothing which is the biggest lie ever told. I don't think that's true at all, and it's a gross misrepresentation that a Socialist society is a "promise of something for nothing". There are a great many people who would benefit by the kind of labour-saving optimisations that a Socialist mode of production introduces, especially those who put in something and get very close to nothing. As Russian anarcho-Communist Kropotkin said in The Conquest of Bread: >In virtue of this monstrous system, the son of the worker, on entering life, finds no field which he may till, no machine which he may tend, no mine in which he may dig, without accepting to leave a great part of what he will produce to a master. He must sell his labour for a scant and uncertain wage. His father and his grandfather have toiled to drain this field, to build this mill, to perfect this machine. They gave to the work the full measure of their strength, and what more could they give? But their heir comes into the world poorer than the lowest savage. If he obtains leave to till the fields, it is on condition of surrendering a quarter of the produce to his master, and another quarter to the government and the middlemen. And this tax, levied upon him by the State, the capitalist, the lord of the manor, and the middleman, is always increasing; it rarely leaves him the power to improve his system of culture. If he turns to industry, he is allowed to work — though not always even that — only on condition that he yield a half or two-thirds of the product to him whom the land recognizes as the owner of the machine.