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Didn't Stalin have gas wagons and mass purges? Seems a bit disingenuous to claim that Marxism killed millions of people while entirely ignoring his unchecked di
by jimbob45 7y ago
Didn't Stalin have gas wagons and mass purges? Seems a bit disingenuous to claim that Marxism killed millions of people while entirely ignoring his unchecked dictatorship.
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoYes, he had mass purges. He also had famines caused by failed agricultural policies. (And he also had famines that seem to have been deliberately killing off groups that he disfavored.) Claiming that he had mass purges doesn't change the fact that his failed agriculture policies were also deadly.
- joshuaheard 7y agoTyrannical dictatorships are an emergent property of Marxism. When you stop allocating resources based on competence, and instead based on other factors, whoever gets to decide these factors ends up with all the wealth and power, since they use the factors they have. For instance in intersectionality, minorities want to take from whites under various guises of white privilege and equity, with the anticipated result being they hold all the wealth and power. If you keep narrowing the criteria, you end up with a tyrannical dictatorship. This is opposite of a constitutional democracy where power is decentralized among voters and limited by a Constitution.
- vageli 7y ago> Tyrannical dictatorships are an emergent property of Marxism. When you stop allocating resources based on competence, and instead based on other factors, whoever gets to decide these factors ends up with all the wealth and power, since they use the factors they have. For instance in intersectionality, minorities want to take from whites under various guises of white privilege and equity, with the anticipated result being they hold all the wealth and power. If you keep narrowing the criteria, you end up with a tyrannical dictatorship. This is opposite of a constitutional democracy where power is decentralized among voters and limited by a Constitution. What is this mythical system that allocates resources based on competence?
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoThe free market?
- smolder 7y agoThe free market allocates resources based on competence at the task of acquiring resources, which doesn't always equate to virtuous contribution. I think it works because it gets some utility out of people's greed instead of none, while appeasing the powerful instead of mobilizing their power against it.
- joshuaheard 7y agoThe free market allocates resources based on the competence of producing goods and services valued by others using money as the medium of exchange. People get utility from voluntary mutually beneficial transactions that satisfy their needs.
- smolder 7y agoThat's the ideal, and you're not wrong, but it ignores the behavioral piece of what really goes on in the world.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoI saw what you did there - changed the story to 'virtuous' from 'competence'. I call foul!
- Spooky23 7y agoFree markets have nothing to do with competence.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoThey select for members that deliver goods and services at a cost (dollars, convenience, timeliness) acceptable to other members of the market. Which is a 'competence function'.