this post was submitted on 05 Jan 2024
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[–] [email protected] 89 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (6 children)

i don't know if i'm a socialist or whatever all i know is that i just want trans and gay people to be able to live their lives, women to not have men make decisions about their bodies, borders to be abolished, people to not want the earth to burn up, and to ducking just care about conserving endangered species.

bonus points for elected officials to behave like fucking grown ass adults for once.

[–] [email protected] 56 points 10 months ago (3 children)

I dont think anything you said would qualify you as a "socialist"

[–] [email protected] 32 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

Counterpoint: If you ask most elected officials edit: in the US (of either party), any two of those as policy goals would make you a socialist.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (1 children)

fuck the US, why is it relevant what they think?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You'll find out when we get done with our "Republic" arc and start the "Empire" one.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago (1 children)

you have been on the empire thing for literal decades

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You ain't seen nothing yet, sheltered child of neoliberalism.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (1 children)

i live in a colony of neoliberalism, im seeing things on a daily basis.

some of which coming from a direct consequence of the empire's decisions. some of which comes from genocides past.

there was never a republic in the first place for us.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago (1 children)

And yet you wonder why it's important what America thinks?

Here's hoping you don't find out.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Counter point, countries exist outside the US

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago
[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

Fair; I've amended my comment.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

And sometimes perception is reality.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I think the abolition of borders falls under the umbrella of socialism

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago (6 children)

Socialism means one thing: democratic control over the economy. It's radically left-wing in most of the world, and because of that socialists also advocate for other radically leftist ideas. I'm one of the radical leftists that don't believe governments should exist at all in their current form, but that's not what makes me a socialist.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Depends on whether you think socialism is inherently globalist, which I wouldn't say is necessarily true.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

It might as well be considering the history of cross-country support. Class above nation, after all.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Socialism by definition will take care of most if not all of these

[–] [email protected] 39 points 10 months ago

That's a progressive outlook, but not a Socialist one, primarily because nothing you said has anything directly to do with Modes of Production.

A Socialist is someone who wants the Means of Production to be collectively shared, rather than privately owned. There are many forms of it, like Syndicalism, Anarchism, Marxism, Market Socialism, etc.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (1 children)

So by your example, a socialist is someone who's not a dick? I can get behind that 😁.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

basically :D

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Not necessarily. Those things can be fixed without instituting socialism (if they're fixable. That's not a given) and may even be done better without it based on socialism's real record!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Same. I believe in the abolition of hierarchy in all forms and a society based on community and co-operation and don’t believe that any human should have any lever on power or control over any other person.

So…I guess I do know. Never mind.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

I would settle for everybody banning TikTok and Facebook usage. That's all I wanted for christmas.

[–] [email protected] 57 points 10 months ago (3 children)

It is worse when you're an anarchist. Best case, they say you're a socialist. Worst case, they say you're an extremist rioter.

Both are not true, but the later couldn't be further from it.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Anarchism would be closer to an extreme libertarianism than socialism. Socialism is usually seen as an overreach of government by those who oppose it, unless they are even further left than that and want more government involvement in the economy. If people can't even wrap their head around your political beliefs, how are you supposed have an intelligent conversation with them?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (1 children)

If socialism is understood as collective/worker ownership of the means of production, which I would argue is a fitting and accurate definition, then anarchism requires socialism in order to end coercive relationships of domination in the workplace. Socialism doesn't necessitate a state and many anarchists/libertarian socialists would argue socialism is impossible with a state

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (1 children)

From a Marxist perspective socialism needs a state. Marx defines socialism as a transitional step to move from capitalism to communism. Marx left it open how communism would be achieved but he did believe that state is necessary for that transition. In his mind the state will be abolished once communism has been effectively achieved. This means the existence of a state is important to socialism, according to Marxism.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

Marx's definition of what constitutes a state is so nebulous that you could consider the organizational structure that most libertarians propose to be a state. Not to throw shade at libertarian marxists, of which there are a good handful. His framework of the state and power structures is lacking and not very useful for anarchist analysis and theory. Our conceptions for what a state is and how power functions are very different from authoritarian conceptions. Marxism isn't the end all be all of socialist theory, and if that's as far as you've gone in your study of the topic I'd be happy to provide some anarchist theory and analysis.

I want to write more and get into the weeds of it but I keep tripping over myself wanting to pull all the strings together but there's just too much to break down for a comment. I'm happy to talk more about the differences but I think we may need to narrow the scope a bit more, or take it one thing at a time. Theres like 5 different tangents I could go off on lol. Or I could drop some links if you'd rather have it all laid out in one shot haha

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I'm an anarcho-syndicalist. I told my cool family members. I just call myself a socialist now around them, it's easier.

[–] [email protected] 43 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

Honestly at a certain point labels only help when you share a common definition with your audience.

If I call myself a socialist I need to preface it by defining socialism because everyone above 25 still thinks it means autocratic dictatorial regime where the government owns your underpants.

I just tell people that democracy is better than monarchy so we should expand that to workplaces and give workers a vote on the direction of their workplace. Most people are more amenable to this than dropping the S word or god forbid C word.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I just tell people that democracy is better than monarchy so we should expand that to workplaces and give workers a vote on the direction of their workplace. Most people are more amenable to this than dropping the S word or god forbid C word.

I used to live out in the boonies, surrounded by rednecks, and this approach worked almost every time unless one of them was well-read enough to know I was talking about socialism.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

And in my experience the well read ones will either screech about socialism or are themselves a socialist.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago

"I'm into super democracy. Would you like to argue against democracy as a concept, or just dance around insisting it's somehow different?"

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago

Im also an anarchist and get around that by pulling the ol switcheroo on them. I say a bunch of anarchist shit I know they'll agree with and when the times right go "yeah and thats why I'm an anarchist". Gets them to open up a bit and leaves them with a better impression of what anarchism actually is

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Are the shouting matches better or worse than the endless Monty Python quotes?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Silly movies made in the 70s by British comedy troupes are no basis for a political ideology! Realistic political strategies are born from reading theory, not some farcical medieval movie!

Why, if I went around calling myself a Christian nationalist because I watched The Life of Brian they'd put me away!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Anarchism is Socialist. It may not be Marxist, but Anarchism cannot exist when property rights create hierarchy.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It does resemble socialism, but there are differences depending on the school of thought of Anarchism that you prefer It is not completely incompatible with individual property.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 months ago (2 children)

How do you have property rights without hierarchy and without a state?

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago

Damn I feel that

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (1 children)

At least the horse is not loose in the hospital anymore.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago

And yet there are entire teams of billionaires attempting to get the horse back into the hospital.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago

That's right, Mattpad

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I want to kill everything, Satan is good, Satan is my friend. I am not Tom Hanks in a movie called the neighbors.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

That's because you are Tom Hanks in The Burbs lol

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