Define communism for dum 'ol Lancer

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Velociryx
I definitely don't want to put words in your mouth:

Please tell me you're just ****ing with me.

[Ned]

Socialists are ultimately greedy beyond the pale. They want state-owned business and independent unions at the same time. In this way, unions can strike and obtain supra-normal wages and benefits without the fear that the businesses giving them these absurd wages can go out of business. Union members in socialism live high on the hog at the expense of everyone else.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Ned
Socialists are ultimately greedy beyond the pale. They want state-owned business and independent unions at the same time. In this way, unions can strike and obtain supra-normal wages and benefits without the fear that the businesses giving them these absurd wages can go out of business. Union members in socialism live high on the hog at the expense of everyone else.

That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Workers want what they earn, nothing more. And there's no reason why they shouldn't get it. It's not at anyone's expense.

[Velociryx]

Well, I see some things never change, including Kid's obsession with arguing without actually saying anything.

Answer me this, Kid:

You're at home in your apartment one day, when the People's Watcher Brigade, Member 98333304485-b11 shows up at your door and tells you to pack your things. Your skills, it seems, are required in LittleRock, Arkansas. This is where you will do society the most good.

Just you.

Your family must stay where they are, because your wife's best use to society is right where she is.

Failure to comply with the wishes of the state will result in your being sent to a re-education camp, and your wife taken to a clinic for observation for a period of not less than six months.

The car's downstairs and waiting. Since you don't own anything anyway, except for a few clothes, you don't have much to pack.

No need to discuss pay, or what you will be doing, since that is not relevent. All you need to know is that the benevolent state has decided that LittleRock, Arkansas is where you will do the most good.

Oh...and once you're there, you'll get a stake in the ownership of the means of production for....well...whatever it is you'll be producing.

You can add in that last bit as a bone, or leave it off....it doesn't disguise what's really going on in that scene, does it?

Slavery, no matter how you slice it.

You can post cute one-line replies, or do the eye-roll thing ( ) or try to be dodgy all day long, but none of that will change the fact....the FACT that the scene just described (taken straight from the pages of your own manifesto) is.....slavery.

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

Oh, and Kid...if people truly want what they earn, then why not let the market mechanism determine the price.

That's one of its functions. That's what it DOES and what it's FOR.

If you want to know what something's worth, put it out on the market and find out.

If you want to play shell games and jack the price up artifically, let the state make some random determination with a magic 8-ball.

Oh I forgot, you're a member of the psychic friends' network and can pull those "completely fair and equitable" wage values from the astral plane.....

-=Vel=-

[Fake Boris]

It doesn't take an astral plane to see that piss poor workers funneling the wealth of billionaires is unfair sharing.

[Agathon]

And Kid....not delusional...hell, you've said yourself on NUMEROUS occassions that you want to force people to work. You've mentioned forcibly relocating families, telling people WHERE they'll work, and on what project, and a host of other things.

Capitalism never does anything like that....

[Velociryx]

It doesn't take an astral plane to see that piss poor workers funneling the wealth of billionaires is unfair sharing.

So...perhaps the billionaires should stop financing factories? Should stop putting their money at risk by creating new jobs?

You know, the easiest way for the Reds to start showing how glorious the revolution could be is to use the current system to amass a fortune, finance the building of their OWN factories, and then turning them over to those who work there.

Amazing though, how you NEVER see anything like that happen....I wonder why not.....

Capitalism never does anything like that....

The copy of that book I've got must have some missing chapters, cos I don't remember the part about how they were forced into slavery. Interesting too that I missed the part where they were ordered to California....which chapter was that stuff in again?

Was the depression-era tough times for everyone?

Absolutely.

Did people get forced off of their land?

Nope....if the bank was involved, then they can't very well say it was "their" land, can they? (sounds like the bank had a claim to it....maybe in the form of a mortgage loan?).

Had they focused on paying the loan off during the fat years and gotten the bank out of the loop, so to speak, it woulda been a pretty short (and not nearly so popular, I think) book!

But it goes back to individual choice (and hand-in-hand with it, individual responsibility), something that scares the bejesus out of you guys, for reasons I can't quite fathom.

-=Vel=-

[Agathon]

Vel. I like you. You seem like a pretty decent guy to me.

Stop doing this. It's not intellectually respectable and it just makes you look bad to people who might otherwise think better of you.

[Kuciwalker]

Moreover, the people wouldn't have been on the farm anyway had it not been for the bank giving them the loan earlier... and the load wouldn't exist without the possibility of being able to call it in. That's the entire point of collateral.

[Kidlicious]

I guess all Vel can do is write fiction stories.

[Velociryx]

Thanks Ag, and btw, the feeling is mutual. I like you, and Spiff, Kid, and Che and actually, all the reds I banter with.

I think your ideas regarding economics are about as behind the times as the seminal document which spawned them, but you guys personally are cool.

It's the economic fairytale I have problems with.

As for fiction, Kid...ohhh no. Fiction is where Communism lives. As soon as we get Star Trek replicators.

Til then, I'll stick with the system that works, thanks.

-=Vel=-

[Agathon]

Til then, I'll stick with the system that works, thanks.

I'll remind you of that when the world is so hot we all have to go around naked.

[Velociryx]

Seriously....what's missing here, from Red-Central, is a plan...a strategy.

Without that, all you've got is talk, and talk is cheap. So...in the good spirit of Ag's last post, I'll GIVE you a strategy, step by step:

1) Get on the same page, or at least, in the same neighborhood. The revolution goes exactly NOWHERE if all you've got is a thousand different-and-competing views on what shape the glorious revolution is going to even TAKE. Right now, we've got the whole gamut from the half-step, worker empowerment of Spiffor, to Ag's replicator's, to Kid's work camp utopia. These aren't even in the same solar system with each other, and won't mesh well together on RevDay1, so pick one and stick with it. Get your fellow comrades behind your vision and a leader emerges.

2) Exploit the current system. Use the current system to amass a huge fortune, and then, use the fortune to gain control of the means of production for yourself. Once you HAVE control, you can turn it over to your Comrades, and thus, give them a real taste of what it'll be like when you wash away the last vestiges of that hellspawn creation that is capitalism. Plus, you'll earn bonus cool points for demonstrating that although you're using the current system, you are not, in fact, a capitalist pig-dog.

3) Having successfully executed steps one and two, you'll be accompanied by an ever-growing legion of faithful who will see the glories of the revolution. Do this often enough, and you'll be able to influence elections. Do THAT, and you'll land seats in congress, and can begin enacting laws that will push the national agenda toward your goals.

From there, it should be easy enough to take it to the next level....

So there you have it....the beginnings of a blueprint to do something other than gab about the utopia.

Who's got the brass to actually try...or is idle chit-chat enough?

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

tsk tsk Ag....you act as though no communist nation has ever contributed to pollution.

Global warming is hardly a capitalist-nation-only problem, but yes, as the world's most powerful and successful economies ARE capitalistic in their natures, they've done more aggregate damage than the reds, true...they've also created more wealth for more people, raising the standards of living to unheard of heights, than all the red experiments put together.

-=Vel=-