Marxism? Is there a problem with it?

[Flemingisa]

First of all let's set something's clear, there will be no russian bashing, no "Marxism" bashing, no bashing of any kind, this will be a intellectual debate based on opinions, don't force your opinion on others.

Anyway, this topic is to debate the ideas of Marxism vs the ideas of Capatilism, which one do you belive is a more successful type of government. And for this debate "Marxism" is not "Stalinism." Post your beliefs on this forum please and I hope this turns into a lively forum debate

[Klopstock]

Nov 24, 2014 21:37:50 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

[T]his topic is to debate the ideas of Marxism vs the ideas of Capatilism, which one do you belive is a more successful type of government.

Remind me. How many marxist countries are still around?

[Flemingisa]

Nov 24, 2014 21:51:38 GMT -5 Klopstock said:

Nov 24, 2014 21:37:50 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

[T]his topic is to debate the ideas of Marxism vs the ideas of Capatilism, which one do you belive is a more successful type of government.

Remind me. How many marxist countries are still around?

if you would please look above i said communism (Stalinism) was not the same as Marxism, Marxism is the ideas of Karl Marx and Vladmir Lenin later on.. I honestly feel that Marxism... Used correctly is better than capatilism.

[Flemingisa]

Of course with a few adjustments of my own design

[Klopstock]

Nov 24, 2014 22:16:44 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

Nov 24, 2014 21:51:38 GMT -5 Klopstock said:

Remind me. How many marxist countries are still around?

if you would please look above i said communism (Stalinism) was not the same as Marxism, Marxism is the ideas of Karl Marx and Vladmir Lenin later on.. I honestly feel that Marxism... Used correctly is better than capatilism.

I appreciate the difference between marxism and communism. Although, to be accurate, you didn't in fact mention communism at all in your opening post. Still, the same question. How many marxist countries are still around?

[Flemingisa]

Nov 24, 2014 22:22:06 GMT -5 Klopstock said:

Nov 24, 2014 22:16:44 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

if you would please look above i said communism (Stalinism) was not the same as Marxism, Marxism is the ideas of Karl Marx and Vladmir Lenin later on.. I honestly feel that Marxism... Used correctly is better than capatilism.

I appreciate the difference between marxism and communism. Although, to be accurate, you didn't in fact mention communism at all in your opening post. Still, the same question. How many marxist countries are still around?

you are right about ne not mentioning communism up top but in my defense I did mention Stalinism, and to answer your question none but I feel that we could create one if we could actually do it correctly and not be like stalin, any thoughts?

[Klopstock]

Nov 24, 2014 22:25:10 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

to answer your question none

That would have been my guess.

I have no instinctive hostility towards marxism. However, I am a pragmatist. Marxism's inability to prove itself as a viable system of government would seem to suggest that it is not a successful type of government at all. I'm not sure what you consider to be a capitalist government, so I won't speak to that just yet.

Maybe on a small scale, a form of marxism could work. Perhaps in a remote mountain valley somewhere, everyone could contribute according to their ability and everyone could receive according to their need. And everyone would remain happy as well. Then again, there are some TV shows which suggests that even that scenario might not work out for the best.

[Flemingisa]

My opinion of a Capatilism country is one like the US in which everything is controlled by money and power.
My opinion of a Marxist country is one in which there can be a small private enterprise but where even those still benefit the community as a whole and there is oppertunities wherever you are in social standing



*also I live in America but I really don't like how corporations control so much of our goverment by lobbyist and whatnot

[Klopstock]

Nov 24, 2014 22:40:38 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

My opinion of a Capatilism country is one like the US in which everything is controlled by money and power.

Money and power play an outsized influence in the economy and government. I can agree to that without difficulty. However, I can't agree that such a problem is confined to capitalist countries like the U.S. The Soviet Union, for example, had a massive wealth and power gap between those self-described marxists in control and everybody else in the country.

My opinion of a Marxist country is one in which there can be a small private enterprise but where even those still benefit the community as a whole and there is oppertunities wherever you are in social standing

That sounds more like a capitalist country to me. Capitalism at its core is about distributing goods based on people's own needs and desires coupled with availability and supply. Prices reflect that intersection. Admittedly, not perfectly. But I've yet to encounter a perfect country, capitalist or marxist.

*also I live in America but I really don't like how corporations control so much of our goverment by lobbyist and whatnot

That sounds more like a failure of government than a failure of capitalism. Indeed, many conservatives would argue that if there were less taxation, regulation, and government-provided services then lobbying would in turn decrease.

[Flemingisa]

While it does seem like a failure of government if you look at the companies seem to control more and more of the government and Americans don't care because we have become tired of the politicians having agendas with companies... If you had a Marxist system the companies would still be thier but they would try to benefit the country not just themselves

[Klopstock]

Nov 24, 2014 23:00:38 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

While it does seem like a failure of government if you look at the companies seem to control more and more of the government and Americans don't care because we have become tired of the politicians having agendas with companies...

The revolving door between corporate America and the American government is a worrisome trend. I certainly agree with that. But I wonder if that's an indictment of corporate America or of the growing size and scope of government? After all, we now have the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau regulating the financial industry. We have the Department of Health and Human Services offering health care to millions of Americans and negotiating premiums and policy coverages with the healthcare industry. And we have the Environmental Protection Agency imposing new regulations on the emission of carbon by power plants and manufacturers. There is also, for that matter, the National Security Agency's use of electronic surveillance to monitor the internet! So many critical economic decisions are made by government officials and civil servants. Why wouldn't companies hire lobbyists to make themselves heard in the corridors of power?

If you had a Marxist system the companies would still be thier but they would try to benefit the country not just themselves

I'm not so sure about that. Companies that only benefit themselves won't survive for long. I mean. there wouldn't be restaurants if people didn't need to eat food, right? There wouldn't be cable companies if people didn't want internet access. And there wouldn't be food and internet unless companies formed to deliver that to consumers. Maybe there's a case to be made that companies don't benefit other people as much -- workers, communities, and other such groups. But there are unions and local zoning ordinances for that sort of thing.

[Deleted]

Capitalism it's the only sistem wich is combined perfectly with human nature.
Humans are competitive and they want to fell the value of their work,in a marxist state a doctor will have the same wage exactly like a street cleaner,this is just  in a :pre marxist state,because Karl Marx ideology wants to abolish money and the state so in a pure marxist state everyone will work for free,for the good of society,it will always remain just a utopia,human race is not created like this.

[Flemingisa]

Nov 25, 2014 9:04:04 GMT -5 @europeanromania said:

Capitalism it's the only sistem wich is combined perfectly with human nature.
Humans are competitive and they want to fell the value of their work,in a marxist state a doctor will have the same wage exactly like a street cleaner,this is just  in a :pre marxist state,because Karl Marx ideology wants to abolish money and the state so in a pure marxist state everyone will work for free,for the good of society,it will always remain just a utopia,human race is not created like this.

but just how the Capatilism system is evolving into what it is today then you must realize that others could take those ideas for which they are a base and then add some ideas so that while it isn't fully Marxism it still has the base foundation of it

[Invictus]

Nov 24, 2014 22:35:17 GMT -5 Klopstock said:

Nov 24, 2014 22:25:10 GMT -5 Flemingisa said:

to answer your question none

That would have been my guess.

I have no instinctive hostility towards marxism. However, I am a pragmatist. Marxism's inability to prove itself as a viable system of government would seem to suggest that it is not a successful type of government at all. I'm not sure what you consider to be a capitalist government, so I won't speak to that just yet.

Maybe on a small scale, a form of marxism could work. Perhaps in a remote mountain valley somewhere, everyone could contribute according to their ability and everyone could receive according to their need. And everyone would remain happy as well. Then again, there are some TV shows which suggests that even that scenario might not work out for the best.

I thought about giving my input for a minute, but Klopstock here pretty much expresses my sentiment perfectly.

[Deleted]

People will never agree with this,everyone is too scared by marxism,comunism,socialism,after the disaster wich happened in east of Europe,even if it can be a good sistem not a lot of people will agree to try it,and if people don't agree, a nation has nothing without democracy,democracy is the engine for a healthy society.

[velias]

Actually, a full socialist state can't work: economically talking, the country will be a close system who just refund itself: i give money to workers, but they will spent it only on statal buisinesses, so you can fight inflation, but your real economy can't delevop; On another side, there will never be competition anymore, and this means less "search and delevop" spending, because the state will think only about production. So with this, it will be a social problem: less medicines, less welfare and less security. A good system control buisinesses affairs, especially sensible ones, like, as I said before, medicines or food.

[Ayriat]

Let me know when a system providing "to each according to their needs, and from each according to their ability" with actual living people exists (even ignoring the fact that you'd need a totalitarian surveillance dictatorship to even start it in the first place).

It's a nice idea, but it's a pipe dream and will never work with anything resembling humans.

Ants, ants do it. And they're pretty successful by some measures.

[Deleted]

There is no such thing as a "more successful type of government", because the human factor manages to always break everything. That includes people outside (too many freedoms) but mostly inside the government. We all know it.
I tend to look at any type of government as a "controlled anarchy", at different levels. They're also and all basically a "patch it up as you go" thing, and eventually get so bloated it becomes increasingly easier to find loopholes, leading to even more corruption and instability. Fact is, most politicians are complete morons that don't care about the needs of the people, all they want is to shove their ideologies and resist ideas that could actually be good for everyone (except them, of course).
All in all, any form of government that involves politicians is a lie. It wouldn't be IF we were a hive mind society, like ants, but alas, we're not.
The only reason why the US does more or less well (or so we think) is because of its huge territory, natural resources and population, when it has been, in fact, rotting from the inside for a long time.
Shameful example.
Anyways, why not throw in Technocracy in the mix? Fact: scientists and intellectuals will ALWAYS be exponentially more reasonable then any politician will be.

[NeoYundar]

I've heard it argued that the family unit is the perfect form of Marxism. I feel like Marxism mostly was a plan for tearing down the old order and replacing it with minimal guidance on how to actually run a society once it was replaced. If only pesky human nature to be rewarded for your work wasn't in the way..

[fmlyhm]

Capitalism is, by definition, an exploitative system. In a capitalist economy the workers sell their labour power (for wages) in order to create goods and/or services. These goods and services are then sold to consumers, with excess value captured as profit by the owners of the corporation. Thus, a capitalistic corporation cannot exist without exploiting it's workers - by paying them less than their labour power is worth.

[Kushastan]

Without corporations we would not have all the doo hickey's and gadgets we use today. Although I agree we need to get big money out of our politics in the USA.

[Klenthium]

Marxism, if it worked as advertised on paper, would be great.
The only problem is, every single time someone has tried to implement it, it goes down in bloody flames and morphs into a mass-murdering oligarchy or dictatorship of some kind or another.
It has essentially a 0% success rate with modern countries and people.

While capitalism is theoretically worse, it also has had successes to go with its failures, and any % success rate is better than 0%.

[oasisa]

Majpor economic ineffcicies, tendancy towards toltaltarian goverments. Socialist democrativ govs better.

Contradict me! I welcome it!

Forward the revolution! God blrss the soldiers of free peoples!

[Hahiha / USSR]

I'm a communist. Ideological communism of course, not that socialism that Lenin and Stalin had.

[alexreich]

Actually Lenin tried his best to build communism, but he also knew(Stalin too) that if a Socialist system will co-exist with a capitalist system in the world then Socialism will lose the ideological war and will not evolve into Communism

[Bolt]

I've been dreading this day. The day the commies took over XKI. I'm handling this pretty well.

[WolfVale]

If there were no barriers to immigration and Russians to freely move here and American could openly move to the Soviet Union, ask yourself one question, where would the people go and why? Throughout history, people vote with their feet if they are able. That's why many people moved here in the first place, and continue today.

[Candlewhisper]

Sept 1, 2015 13:05:28 GMT -5 Bolt said:

I've been dreading this day. The day the commies took over XKI. I'm handling this pretty well.

"The commies"? Really?

For my own part, I'm unconvinced of the practical possibility of a Marxist society, and think that utopian socialism is about as realistic as utopian capitalism. I'd categorise myself as left-of-centre, believing in the innovative power of a well regulated free market economy, and a careful balance between civil rights and societal good, with a natural conservatism that sees value in the lower risk of a broadly pro status quo bias. 

However, even as a non-communist, I recognise that the term "commie" is basically just laughing off a whole batch of ideas by sticking a dismissive label on them. Its classic demonisation of an enemy, and a refusal to engage in rational discourse.

I know, of course, you reserve the right to use whatever derogatory terms you like, much as I'm sure you reserve your right to call an Arab a raghead or a gay man a homo. However, I think its worth you knowing that in using derogatory terms you appear - to anyone outside your own immediate circle of political beliefs - as someone who is close-minded and dismissive.

Using derogatory terms basically makes you look like you're not someone who thinks about things, or is willing to think about things.

I'd like to hope this isn't the case: I am presuming you came to your current beliefs because you've thought hard about them, and your presence in a Debate Hall forum suggests that you'd like more other people to think as you do. Is this the case?

If so, perhaps you have a constructive criticism of communism to present, rather than just a dismissive label?

[Bolt]

First off, I am probably the only full-blown capitalist who is also a gay rights supporter. Second, I was not using "commie" as a derogatory term. I just like to use it for some reason. Third, I do have reasoning for why communism is bad.

It leaches off the rich, stealing money they rightfully earned.

It (almost always) leads to a dictatorship (give me an example of a successful communist nation).

It gives free money to people who slack off, giving them less of a motivation to work hard.

[Candlewhisper]

Reasonable counterarguments, I think. Personally, as a left-leaning non-communist I broadly agree with your three points. I think there has to be some right of private property in a civilised society, I think excessive centralisation leads to tyranny and I agree that humans aren't noble enough to do the dirty and unpleasant jobs unless there is financial incentive to do so.

I wonder though, as a full blown capitalist, do you also recognise that there are social costs to capitalism? Do you basically think these costs are worth paying for the benefits of such a system, or do you basically not recognise that those costs exist?