Socialist or Communist?

in theory communism is a very good gov't.....the people are ruled by the people who work for the good of all people.... a lot of people interchange it with socialism, which is ruled by a ruler instead of the people. but there is always some person who want everything for itself and thatr is when communism is messed up. so in reality, communism is not perfect. so i guess the search for the perfect gov't is still going on. but i find it funny how people in America love America cuz they have the freedom to make choices....and then only 30% of the populaion votes. i find that kind of interesting.

 

rule by the people you say? have you seen the people lately, a bunch of superstitous religious bigots. fuck the people. we need 1 strong just leader.

 

yeah, thats why it doesn't works...stupid selfish people. Remember the saying "absolute power corrupts absolutly"? don't forget Stalin, Mussolini, Hitler, and maybe Bush even...

 

No government is a good government, at it's best, merely a tolerable evil.

 

I sure hope you don't vote.

 

Um, okay, I mostly agree with what you said, but just because someone is religious doesn't automatically make them a racist, sexist, homophobe! Buddhism is a religion too; do you group Buddhists under that phrase as well? Don't let a bunch of racist religious fanatics from the depths of Louisiana hinder your view on all religious people because that is an untrue, offensive stereotype.

 

Communism is a horrible idea, uniformity in everything leads to originality in nothing.

 

Both communism and capitalism are proven failures. Long live democratic socialism!

 

So America is a failure? Japan is a failure?

 

not my point exactly... capitalism has worked very well for america. But if your to look at the third world countries over run by AmeriKan coporation owned sweatshops, or how the oil companies(and others) influence American polotics, its not such a pretty picture. we are at the top of the capitalistic pyrimid, and we live in an extreamly capitalistic world.

 

anyone who places faith in any type of divine being is automatically denounceing reason in favor of a childs fairy tale, these people are dangerous and pathetic.

 

Depends on how you measure the success or failure of Capitalism.

Capitalism has failed to bring:
- a enlightened society
- a happy society
- a end to poverty

On the positive side Capitalism has brought industrialization and wealth but depending on your view these also could be seen as failure .

 

Voting in U.S. elections is bullshit Of course that's just my opinion as an anarchist really, but not voting can be just as stupid as voting. It's like when there's an election goin' on, that's the perfect time to be trying to tell ppl why yer not voting, rather than just not showing up at the polls, staying home, getting drunk, etc. (business as usual).

What I mean is that if a person who doesn't vote in elections wants to, (s)he can find better ways to work towards a more free and just society than that which is available to us through the present state of affairs politically. It's basically a question of ppl taking Direct Action versus ppl having to submit to the system in place which is designed to disempower us from what's really goin' on.

I like Direct Action, I like communities turning themselves into autonomous zones where everyone's got everybody's back and shit's all good, where the cops are told to stay the fuck away! That's the kinda thing all my friends and I are werking towards as Subvertistas in the struggle for freedom from government. It's sorta fun too.

Trin

 

Choosing not to vote is a choice.

 

Compared to what? Capitalist societies encourage trade (of ideas as well as products and services), which leads to "enlightenment."

While there are some capitalist countries that try to suppress the spread of new ideas, such communication is almost ALWAYS repressed in communist states.

Capitalism provides the capability of technological innovation, which usually translates into more leisure time and a higher life expectancy. Even if money can't directly buy happiness (which I think varies from person to person), few people would argue that more leisure time and a longer lifepsan are bad things.

It hasn't ENDED poverty. But capitalism has made significant progress toward that goal, whereas communist countries continue to wallow in poverty and have made little to no progress since the 1960s.

 

Communism is messed up because it violates too many "economic laws".

With no market prices telling them what to produce or how much,communist countries either over produced or under produced products. Also,trying to pay everybody the same to avoid class differences no matter what job or how much they produced hurt worker motivation.

 

America isn't pure capitalism. Government still mucks around with the market, sets tariffs, enforces minimum wages, etc. All taht should be be abolished to follow a "true capitalism".

I likes my socialism. Communism is too easily corrupted. Socialism sets up safety nets so that if people fall under unfortunate circumstances, they aren't going to starve to death, or freeze to death. Socialism just makes me happy.

 

Just to point out, a lot of forms of Buddhism are pretty damn sexist (I'm thinking Theravada and Mahayana specifically). If I'm not mistaken, Pure Land is the only one where women can attain nirvana.

 

Enlightenment is wisdom not knowledge. Wisdom is awareness that is brought by radical doubt of knowledge. The path to knowledge is learning while the path of wisdom is unlearning, to free ones minds from the idea of truisms.

The very fact Capitalist societies has a education system based on knowledge instead of wisdom shows not only failure of Capitalism to bring enlightment but it doesn't even try.

Actully while we do have longer life, we had don't have more lesiure time. Go around the households of USA and see how many hours daily they have to just have fun, you'll find that for every time savings capitalism brought there has been new tasks to take away that time. Even our youth (in general) has lost leisure time as we rush them from one thing to another that takes away their time to just have fun. Remeber with lesiure activies it is the journey, not the destination that is important.

Yet while the USA has the resources to house and feed all of its citizens yet it doesn't

Your point is only vaild if you look at the issue via a materialistic view of the world.

 

As direct witness, I confirm Kandahar's and Motion's posts. Communism prouved to be no valid alternative to capitalism.

Trin, problem in the US with voting is that republicans and democrats are no true alternatives, they are almost the same.

We had elections last autumn and beleive me, they meant a change!