3 ms·

No, "we" didn't try anything. Please stop assuming that a few corrupt governments "trying" to do something vaguely similar to what was suggested half a century

No, "we" didn't try anything. Please stop assuming that a few corrupt governments "trying" to do something vaguely similar to what was suggested half a century ago and failing implies that it simply doesn't work ever under any conditions.

blumkvist 12y ago
Maybe not under any conditions but the conditions are not met, maybe never will be. Simply because you were born, doesn't mean you are entitled to anything. Is a lion entitled to anything when it is born? Yes, we humans strive to be better than lions. This doesn't mean we've achieved that yet.
- c22 12y ago
  > Simply because you were born, doesn't mean you are entitled to anything. The United States and most of the rest of civilization disagrees with this statement. We call the things you are entitled to "human rights" and while there may be disagreement as to which rights ought to be applied, it is a completely radical view to claim that society should not offer any basic protections. It is from the complex interplay of society that we obtain our unique and impressive powers, this is why lions are not running shit on this planet.
- vidarh 12y ago
  > Maybe not under any conditions but the conditions are not met, maybe never will be. Maybe so, but a key point is that the conditions have not been met anywhere where people tried to force socialist revolutions. The idea that you could manage to make socialist revolutions work in underdeveloped agrarian economies stems from people like Lenin and Mao, not Marx. Marx, on the contrary warned against it decades before. > Simply because you were born, doesn't mean you are entitled to anything. There you are in violent agreement with Marx. Marx spent a lot of effort arguing against the idea of a welfare system that would give everyone the same without contributing. E.g. in. Critique of the Gotha Programme, he goes as far as pointing out that too much emphasis had been put on redistribution and "fair distribution" and points out various unintended consequences of the proposed program that he saw as counterproductive to the development of socialism and later communism. One of the most famous tenets of Marxism is exactly "from each according to ability, to each according to need". There's nothing there about being entitled to anything just for being born. On the contrary, there is an expectation of duty. Only those totally unable to contribute are left off the hook if they want to expect society to in help. The "welfare entitlement" comes from the social democrats - the beginnings of which were the main influence Marx was arguing against in Critique of the Gotha Programme.
  - blumkvist 12y ago
    >from each according to ability, to each according to need I was born and live in a post-soviet country. Born exactly when the communist regime (supposedly) fell. I know this slogan very well. The problem with it is that when everyone is a principal, noone is a principal. It's not about economic development, but philosophical one. People (and all of nature) is in constant movement. From trees spreading seeds, to endorphins in the human brain when you achieve success. If you remove this reward system from the social framework people just stop caring. If you don't have a carrot to chase, you stop walking. You see this very clearly when you manage people in any capacity. What you are left with then, is a very, very small group of people involved in making the decisions, contrary to any syndicalism thought. Soon those few people get intoxicated by the power and corruption, in all its forms, erodes the whole system. Slowly, but painfully. When you make policy, you have to be very careful and cautious. It's one thing to have horizontal structure in Valve and 37signals, where pre-selection means you already are in the top 1% of speciments. Thinking you can translate that success to the other 99% of the population is naive and vain. Vanity is certainly devil's most favorite sin.

blumkvist 12y ago

Maybe not under any conditions but the conditions are not met, maybe never will be. Simply because you were born, doesn't mean you are entitled to anything. Is a lion entitled to anything when it is born? Yes, we humans strive to be better than lions. This doesn't mean we've achieved that yet.

c22 12y ago
> Simply because you were born, doesn't mean you are entitled to anything. The United States and most of the rest of civilization disagrees with this statement. We call the things you are entitled to "human rights" and while there may be disagreement as to which rights ought to be applied, it is a completely radical view to claim that society should not offer any basic protections. It is from the complex interplay of society that we obtain our unique and impressive powers, this is why lions are not running shit on this planet.
vidarh 12y ago
> Maybe not under any conditions but the conditions are not met, maybe never will be. Maybe so, but a key point is that the conditions have not been met anywhere where people tried to force socialist revolutions. The idea that you could manage to make socialist revolutions work in underdeveloped agrarian economies stems from people like Lenin and Mao, not Marx. Marx, on the contrary warned against it decades before. > Simply because you were born, doesn't mean you are entitled to anything. There you are in violent agreement with Marx. Marx spent a lot of effort arguing against the idea of a welfare system that would give everyone the same without contributing. E.g. in. Critique of the Gotha Programme, he goes as far as pointing out that too much emphasis had been put on redistribution and "fair distribution" and points out various unintended consequences of the proposed program that he saw as counterproductive to the development of socialism and later communism. One of the most famous tenets of Marxism is exactly "from each according to ability, to each according to need". There's nothing there about being entitled to anything just for being born. On the contrary, there is an expectation of duty. Only those totally unable to contribute are left off the hook if they want to expect society to in help. The "welfare entitlement" comes from the social democrats - the beginnings of which were the main influence Marx was arguing against in Critique of the Gotha Programme.
- blumkvist 12y ago
  >from each according to ability, to each according to need I was born and live in a post-soviet country. Born exactly when the communist regime (supposedly) fell. I know this slogan very well. The problem with it is that when everyone is a principal, noone is a principal. It's not about economic development, but philosophical one. People (and all of nature) is in constant movement. From trees spreading seeds, to endorphins in the human brain when you achieve success. If you remove this reward system from the social framework people just stop caring. If you don't have a carrot to chase, you stop walking. You see this very clearly when you manage people in any capacity. What you are left with then, is a very, very small group of people involved in making the decisions, contrary to any syndicalism thought. Soon those few people get intoxicated by the power and corruption, in all its forms, erodes the whole system. Slowly, but painfully. When you make policy, you have to be very careful and cautious. It's one thing to have horizontal structure in Valve and 37signals, where pre-selection means you already are in the top 1% of speciments. Thinking you can translate that success to the other 99% of the population is naive and vain. Vanity is certainly devil's most favorite sin.