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have you read marx? he didn't have any actual conception of a communist society. and anyway, that's a bit like trying to understand capitalism by only reading a

by smhost 8y ago

have you read marx? he didn't have any actual conception of a communist society. and anyway, that's a bit like trying to understand capitalism by only reading adam smith, which would be incoherent. and it sounds like you're really describing the 20th century model of essentially replacing boards of directors with government officials and calling that communism. and that's the most basic and universal criticism of 20th century communism that marxists have today, which is that that model preserved the internal logic of capitalism by preserving the structures which concentrated (capital) power within a handful of people in the same way that capitalism does, or something like that. and if you're being faithful to marx, none of those are communist societies, it's more like stage zero socialism. i'm not trying to start a flame war, i was just confused about what you were saying, but i think i understand now.

TomMarius 8y ago
> he didn't have any actual conception of a communist society This is my point, actually. There is no one who would forbid a group of people to appoint a few members of their community to be "police"; there is no one who would forbid a group of people to create a court. And there is nothing saying that would make it a state. Communism is about self-governed societies, not anarchy in the destructive "I can do whatever because there is no police" sense. Even actual anarchy wouldn't be like that because if you hurt enough people, they will hurt you, and that's why you don't even do it. Later in development, they'd pay someone in advance to hurt you if you hurt them. The same thing would happen in communism, just there wouldn't be money changing hands and the organizational specifics would be different. Saying that any form of leadership would make a stateless society not stateless is nonsense. My family is not a state and yet we have a leader. My apartment building is not a state and yet we have a leader. Etc. There will always be a leader (or a group of leaders), the difference lies in who owns what and how are the leaders appointed (e.g. on basis of what) and what rights they have. Without any leaders, the society would collapse.

by smhost 8y ago

TomMarius 8y ago

> he didn't have any actual conception of a communist society This is my point, actually. There is no one who would forbid a group of people to appoint a few members of their community to be "police"; there is no one who would forbid a group of people to create a court. And there is nothing saying that would make it a state. Communism is about self-governed societies, not anarchy in the destructive "I can do whatever because there is no police" sense. Even actual anarchy wouldn't be like that because if you hurt enough people, they will hurt you, and that's why you don't even do it. Later in development, they'd pay someone in advance to hurt you if you hurt them. The same thing would happen in communism, just there wouldn't be money changing hands and the organizational specifics would be different. Saying that any form of leadership would make a stateless society not stateless is nonsense. My family is not a state and yet we have a leader. My apartment building is not a state and yet we have a leader. Etc. There will always be a leader (or a group of leaders), the difference lies in who owns what and how are the leaders appointed (e.g. on basis of what) and what rights they have. Without any leaders, the society would collapse.