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I agree with your second paragraph completely, but I would say that a Scandinavian-style democratic socialism has plenty of evidence for a system that works bet

I agree with your second paragraph completely, but I would say that a Scandinavian-style democratic socialism has plenty of evidence for a system that works better. A Mondragon-style cooperative system has a much smaller sample size, but even more positive results in a myriad of outcomes. There's enough alternatives out there to get a conversation started, we shouldn't be dismissive.

jltsiren 2y ago
Social democracy, not democratic socialism. Scandinavian social democrats abandoned socialism during the cold war and embraced mostly free but regulated markets. Democratic socialism is more similar to what Eurocommunists believed in, but most of them also abandoned socialism after the cold war.
- aredox 2y ago
  Scandinavian countries have tax rates above 50%, quasi free healthcare and free meals at school. In the US that isn't even considered socialist, That's seen at total communism that would destroy the country in q couple years. Scandinavian countries have done it for decades and are some of the freest countries in the world.
  - jltsiren 2y ago
    Socialism means the abolition of private property. If it's possible to own shares in a company you don't work in, the country is by definition not socialist. Actual socialism was a mainstream political option in Europe until recently. Using the word to refer to something mostly unrelated will only confuse people.
    - JohnBooty 2y ago
      Marx's version of "socialism" meant the abolition of private property. In practicality, like it or not, "socialism" is used to represent an extremely large range of ideas. Today it almost exclusively refers to "social democracy" (ie, what we see in Scandinavia) and almost nobody is out here advocating for the abolition of private property. In America, we see a lot of intentional conflation of these terms, used as a scare tactic, because our public is under-educated on these terms and we have a lot of emotional baggage left over from the Cold War. Many in the media and in politics talk about socialist ideas such as free healthcare and education as if they're a prelude to full-blown Marxist abolition of private property when in reality, literally nobody is asking for that.
      - jltsiren 2y ago
        In American use, "socialism" often means the same as "fascism": people and ideas on the other side you don't like. In European use, it often refers to actual socialism, though this varies by country. When it means actual socialism, the left rarely talks about it at all. Because it's something they (or their parents/grandparents) explicitly rejected. As someone working in an American university known for activism, it seems to me that actual socialism is more popular in the US than in Europe. When something happens on campus, socialists are often involved. But almost none of the radical left activists I knew as a student in Finland were socialists.
    - aredox 2y ago
      You are mixing socialism and communism.
  - shrimp_emoji 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - drewcoo 2y ago
    In the US the last President to try to give us all free health care was Nixon. Early on, Nixon made his name rooting out communists in America with HUAC. How times have changed.
    - red-iron-pine 2y ago
      even tried to implement a negative income tax until that got torpedoed by his advisors. also set up the EPA.

jltsiren 2y ago

Social democracy, not democratic socialism. Scandinavian social democrats abandoned socialism during the cold war and embraced mostly free but regulated markets. Democratic socialism is more similar to what Eurocommunists believed in, but most of them also abandoned socialism after the cold war.

aredox 2y ago
Scandinavian countries have tax rates above 50%, quasi free healthcare and free meals at school. In the US that isn't even considered socialist, That's seen at total communism that would destroy the country in q couple years. Scandinavian countries have done it for decades and are some of the freest countries in the world.
- jltsiren 2y ago
  Socialism means the abolition of private property. If it's possible to own shares in a company you don't work in, the country is by definition not socialist. Actual socialism was a mainstream political option in Europe until recently. Using the word to refer to something mostly unrelated will only confuse people.
  - JohnBooty 2y ago
    Marx's version of "socialism" meant the abolition of private property. In practicality, like it or not, "socialism" is used to represent an extremely large range of ideas. Today it almost exclusively refers to "social democracy" (ie, what we see in Scandinavia) and almost nobody is out here advocating for the abolition of private property. In America, we see a lot of intentional conflation of these terms, used as a scare tactic, because our public is under-educated on these terms and we have a lot of emotional baggage left over from the Cold War. Many in the media and in politics talk about socialist ideas such as free healthcare and education as if they're a prelude to full-blown Marxist abolition of private property when in reality, literally nobody is asking for that.
    - jltsiren 2y ago
      In American use, "socialism" often means the same as "fascism": people and ideas on the other side you don't like. In European use, it often refers to actual socialism, though this varies by country. When it means actual socialism, the left rarely talks about it at all. Because it's something they (or their parents/grandparents) explicitly rejected. As someone working in an American university known for activism, it seems to me that actual socialism is more popular in the US than in Europe. When something happens on campus, socialists are often involved. But almost none of the radical left activists I knew as a student in Finland were socialists.
  - aredox 2y ago
    You are mixing socialism and communism.
- shrimp_emoji 2y ago
  [flagged]
- drewcoo 2y ago
  In the US the last President to try to give us all free health care was Nixon. Early on, Nixon made his name rooting out communists in America with HUAC. How times have changed.
  - red-iron-pine 2y ago
    even tried to implement a negative income tax until that got torpedoed by his advisors. also set up the EPA.