Political Profile: carmen510

**Zealot_Kommunizma** · Subject: Re: Political Profile: carmen510 Mon May 04, 2009 10:29 pm

WeiWuWei wrote:

God dammit, ZK beat me to the mega post. Sad

I'd say you pretty much complemented mine , which was perhaps, quite focused on semantics.

WWW wrote:

I think people do inherently know what's in their best interest. But propaganda is a very real - and to the busy lunatics who rule over us, necessary - component of democracy; people can be convinced that a thing that is against their interest truly is, and vice versa.

And this would probably get us to a whole philosphic debate on democracy.

If I contend that democracy is the power of the people thus everyone having equal power (defacto anarchy) then I'd also contend that minsinformed and ignorant persons automatically lose or don't have power.

Also, we fall into the "expertise and knowledge as means to get authority" thing. For example, as I said somewhere else in State University I think, a doctor has authority over you in regards to your health and overall physical integrity considering you may lack the knowledges about these matters that he has. You determine that you have the need to get well, but he determines the way to achieve that goal of yours. The same happens with nearly everything: construction, machinery, agronomy, etc.

Point made.

WuWuWu wrote:

The State exists under Socialism only to secure political - not economic - gains for the working class. The working class, the people directly, own the productive forces under both Socialism and Communism.

If the state exists it determines and enforces the policies so the state ultimately determines to what ends will the means of production be used. For state to work under socialism it would have to unavoidably serve the interest of the workers, that is, merely as a mechanism entirely subject to the workers. But if the state is a means of coercion and it has no power over the workers... then what's it's purpose whatsoever?

WWW wrote:

So theoretically, no, the State does not own "everything for the good of the people" under Socialism. You were right with your first answer: "the citizenry."

I wouldn't say "theoretically". If in practice the state owns the means of production then it is not socialism both theoretically and pragmatically.

TrippleW wrote:

I think the notion that technology would not improve under Communism isn't fair.

Not only it is not fair, it's absolutely ludicrous (sorry for the tone but It definitely makes no sense). To claim technology wouldn't advance just because there's no competition for survival or profit is absolutely absurd and requires to completely disregard the process by and the reasons for which technology is developed in the first place. And I'd even contend it also requires to disregard the character of scientists and innovators.

Technology is there to ease things, that is, make our labour more efficient by making it less demaning in both strength and time, to allow for a greater output and/r to overall suffice a need impossible to suffice without it.

Taking into account that we naturally search to suffice our needs in an ever more efficent way, within a communist framework this development would happen at even faster rates. Considering that people do not count with the material limitations of capitalism, knowledge would be distributed far more efficiently allowing for enhanced cognoscitive capabilities; since the objective is to suffice needs as opposed to creating "cost-efficient goods" for profit along no need for income to keep industries afloat (or the "need to keep them afloat" whatsoever), there would be no reason to diminish quality - it would always be as high as cognoscitive capabilities allowed; since the users would be involved in the productive process, "quality control" would happen directly, naturally and in the most efficient possible way; related to lack of material limitations: since there's no need for investment, bureaucracy, cost-efficience (not to confuse with "resource management", marketing, etc. all it would take would be initiative, knowledge, organization and will all within a totally self-correcting framework, nothing more.

Maximum efficience and quality could (I'd say "would") be democratically achieved.

WWW wrote:

I just tend to think that people are genuinely good, and will want to improve their living conditions for more reasons than just to make a profit.

And even from a merely rational point of view: we want to have the maximum ammount of free time possible (understading "free time" as time that we can individually manage as we please, taht is, without what I'll call "communitary responsabilities" or "responsabilities with the collective" - this taken for granted within a collectivist economic framework). To get this free time, we have to dedicate as few time as possible to what is objectively necesary (work to suffice basic needs) and supposing that we don't actually find it joyous (which many do, specially researchers and innovators) and that is achieved with better technology.

Again, though, I think you're conflating "Communism" with Soviet and Sino models of - and I'm really cringing at the thought that I'm going to say this - "Socialism." Under Communism, there won't be wages. Therefore, there will be no wages to steal. Razz

But you and I do agree that theft in this way is not a good thing.

Nothing else is too disagreeable with this part. Smile

WWW wrote:

As a minor side, I should mention two things:

A.) I didn't read ZK's wall o' text yet, so I may have said similar stuff as he did - he and I tend to agree on quite a lot.

Tru dat brah. I think we complemented each other. As i said, I greatly focused on semantics and their importance, in some things. Proper Communication (Communism-Communication, coincidence? Don't think so!) is essential.

WWW wrote:

B.) I don't know why you got flack for supporting the right to guns. I don't own any, but I think everyone - literally, everyone - should. When your government gets out of hand, it needs to know that its citizenry is able and willing to resist it.

That's all I've got for now. Smile

This unavoidably brought to my mind RedSoviet's (and many persons') notions that people would go on killing sprees if there was no state (or god for that matter) because the only thing preventing them from killing their peers (for fun and excitement, in their words) is fear to punishment...

You really have to suffer from some mental imbalance or a lot of rage to think that. I actually have desired to kill people in some stages of my life and what prevented me from doing it was reasoning that there's no point and no benefit in causing harm to others, I wasn't even afraid to die.

But well, this is discussion for another thread, which I'll open!

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