Opinion I am deeply concerned. The influence of Marxism and current civil unrest

[feedmelies]

Wait, can you summarize what comes after "here's why" on pages 2-5?

I liked your OP btw, though I wouldn't usually say so in polite company. I think the connection is a little more cloudy theoretically and that "Marxism" might just be a brand label, but there's definitely something going on here.

It's hard to summarize because it doesn't make sense. Something about colonialism, racism, subjugation, etc. It usually comes down to "oppression" and "power struggles," like critical theory emphasizes. There's no real logic to it. It's all about feelings.

 

[feedmelies]

When you don't deal with social/economic issues, this is the result. Shit on the lower/middle classes long enough and what do you know here come the socialist ideals.

It's more the illusion of being shit on and totally misunderstanding economics/buying into horrendously wrong messages of economics. For example, Bernie has been harping "The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer" forever. It's unequivocally wrong. Both are getting richer. He's promoting false ideas and people are getting riled up over it.

 

[lowlife]

It's more the illusion of being shit on and totally misunderstanding economics/buying into horrendously wrong messages of economics. For example, Bernie has been harping "The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer" forever. It's unequivocally wrong. Both are getting richer. He's promoting false ideas and people are getting riled up over it.

So income inequality is a lie? And there's no such thing as the prison industrial complex, and our govt didn't let big pharma make opioid addicts out of a large portion of our population etc etc. Maybe you can help me understand why our debt to GDP is currently sitting at 107% as we continue to print money and "bail out" private institutions? You're right, everything is fine nothing to see here!

 

[cleetus]

you're a moron

you understand exactly 0 about marxism

everything you know about Marx and communism comes from propaganda

we need a dramatic move to the left to turn this country around and there's no denying that

the USA is the worst-off country in ALL of the developed world and our problems are too numerous to count

the US is a corporate fascist militarized state and people like OP and the right have enabled and allowed this to happen

Then GTFO asshole.

 

[Tycho- Taylor's Version]

It's hard to summarize because it doesn't make sense. Something about colonialism, racism, subjugation, etc. It usually comes down to "oppression" and "power struggles," like critical theory emphasizes. There's no real logic to it. It's all about feelings.

Hmmm, I don't think that's the case. I mean I agree it all becomes about "feelings" (or power, more importantly) eventually, but that's the end of a long thought process that is pessimistic about the possibility of applying reason in such a way that supercedes more basic group differences. It's probably coherent and worth interrogating, even if the criticisms of it usually aren't.

 

[Corn Pop Hombre]

Then GTFO asshole.

No u

 

[A.S. Deep]

It's more the illusion of being shit on and totally misunderstanding economics/buying into horrendously wrong messages of economics. For example, Bernie has been harping "The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer" forever. It's unequivocally wrong. Both are getting richer. He's promoting false ideas and people are getting riled up over it.

So income inequality is a lie? And there's no such thing as the prison industrial complex, and our govt didn't let big pharma make opioid addicts out of a large portion of our population etc etc. Maybe you can help me understand why our debt to GDP is currently sitting at 107% as we continue to print money and "bail out" private institutions? You're right, everything is fine nothing to see here!

@feedmelies

It's 100% possible for both the rich and poor to get richer, while income equality also increases.

Person A- $100
Person B- $50

Person A- $1,000
Person B- $250

Both people got richer in my example, but the gap between them also increased.

 

[HunterAcosta]

They're the same problem. This is one big attempt to take the middle class down a peg and hollow out small businesses. These idiots haven't looked around and noticed that their little "movement" is completely approved by every billionaire and major corporation. The problem isn't that small businesses are not that easy to start to begin with, then get taxed, regulated, looted, shut down, and swallowed by corporations, it's that damn Christopher Columbus and those damn white Trump voters in flyover states that need to be stamped out, and then we can all just work for Amazon, costco, walmart, and citibank and everyone else can just take a measly allowance to shut up and go away.



What the eff are you talking about? Yes, we do have marxists in the federal government, you moron. Bernie Sanders is a senator, there are several house members, and that’s just the elected seats. Nearly the entire permanent administrative state are anti-private business, want more taxes, more state control over nearly everything and the opposition to the current attempted marxist takeover has been nil from the entire democrat party.

"Reeeee! Taxes aren't high enough for the people who already pay most of the taxes. We need higher taxes because the world's largest federal budget in history isn't quite high enough, REEEEE! WHY WON'T THEY TAX US MORE. If we had higher taxes, that would solve all my problems, REEEEE"

Difference is a rich guy paying more taxes only takes away from his mistresses and 58 th vacation that year while the middle class and lower tax increases can be the difference between them paying the rent , eating , making car payments or keeping The lights on but I wouldn’t expect you to care cause you’re too in love with the “job creators “ to care . It’s ok though . They love you back . They really do. Surely .

 

[Corn Pop Hombre]

It doesn't appear you've read my whole OP.

I am not "the right." I am an independent. It's true that it's mostly the right who have been calling this crap out. But many on the left have too. And they've been ostracized for it.

If you read my posts, you'd understand that my concern is not that there's a takeover lead by pure communists. My concern is that Marxist ideas and ideas influenced by Marxism are flourishing and imparting significant influence.

However, Marxist influence is more pervasive than you think.



https://www.cnn.com/2016/09/15/politics/john-brennan-cia-communist-vote/index.html

Saul Alinksy has had significant influence on major politicians, such as Obama and Hillary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saul_Alinsky

And, members of "the squad" clearly espouse Marxist ideas.



https://truthout.org/articles/ocasi...end-unrest-end-the-conditions-that-create-it/

I'm pretty stoked about the spread of marxism. Sorry it ruffles your feathers.

Capitalism breeds socialism. As long as workers are having their labor exploited there will always be those that are dissatisfied with that and will seek alternatives

 

[A.S. Deep]

I'm pretty stoked about the spread of marxism. Sorry it ruffles your feathers.

Capitalism breeds socialism. As long as workers are having their labor exploited there will always be those that are dissatisfied with that and will seek alternatives

Though, you'd agree that the best way forward is creating a more fair version of capitalism, right? One where workers are not exploited and thus doesn't inevitably lead to civil unrest and Marxism?

 

[Corn Pop Hombre]

Though, you'd agree that the best way forward is creating a more fair version of capitalism, right? One where workers are not exploited and thus doesn't inevitably lead to civil unrest and Marxism?

I think you might have a misunderstanding of marxism. A system which does not exploit workers by design cannot be capitalism. Capitalism is fundamentally built on profiting from the work of others and redistributing money upwards as a result.

A system in which workers fully own their own labor and its benefits is a form of socialism and would avoid marxist critique.

 

[A.S. Deep]

I think you might have a misunderstanding of marxism. A system which does not exploit workers by design cannot be capitalism. Capitalism is fundamentally built on profiting from the work of others and redistributing money upwards as a result.

A system in which workers fully own their own labor and its benefits is a form of socialism and would avoid marxist critique.

How is paying your workers a livable wage, treating them with respect, and helping them build their skills "exploiting" them?

Because that's what my dad does, for example. Neither side is taking advantage of the other in any way close to exploitation.

 

[TheGreatA]

Doesn't Marxism usually end up looking like an oligarchy anyways?

Mikhali Bakunin already exposed this aspect of Marxism in the 19th century (in direct debates with Karl Marx). It's a shame that nobody listened.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_class
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Bakunin#Critique_of_Marxism

To a lesser degree Dostoevsky did also. Despite being sort of a caricature, it's astonishing how closely the USSR came to resemble his described theory of the "nihilist state" (a country established with mass murder/purges, where the 90+% would serve as forced labour for the few "revolutionaries").

Shigalyev is a historian and social theorist, the intellectual of Verkhovensky's revolutionary group, who has devised a system for the post-revolution organization of mankind. "My conclusion" he says, "stands in direct contradiction to the idea from which I started. Proceeding from unlimited freedom, I end with unlimited despotism."[49] Ninety percent of society is to be enslaved to the remaining ten percent. Equality of the herd is to be enforced by police state tactics, state terrorism, and destruction of intellectual, artistic, and cultural life. It is estimated that about a hundred million people will need to be killed on the way to the goal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demons_(Dostoevsky_novel)

Marxism's goal was always intended by idle elitists such as Engels and Marx to be an oligarchy where the brain-washed, unintelligent masses would serve the "intelligentsia", a.k.a lazy hedonistic pricks such as themselves, who had a gift for bullshitting (for both of them, their only source of income was their wealthy, hard-working fathers, neither worked a real "working class" job for a day in their lives).

There's a reason why DDR and USSR and other communist countries were filled with pieces of shit like this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavrentiy_Beria#Sexual_predator
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceaușescu#Personality_cult_and_totalitarianism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_Mielke#Indictments

It's a shame to society that people still haven't figured out this pathetic pyramid scheme which has been run on gullible people so many times, with the exact same results.

 

[Natural Order]

I'm pretty stoked about the spread of marxism. Sorry it ruffles your feathers.

Capitalism breeds socialism. As long as workers are having their labor exploited there will always be those that are dissatisfied with that and will seek alternatives

In a country where anybody is free to become their own boss......lol.

 

[A.S. Deep]

In a country where anybody is free to become their own boss......lol.

Lol this was my first thought as well.

 

[Natural Order]

Mikhali Bakunin already exposed this aspect of Marxism in the 19th century (in direct debates with Karl Marx). It's a shame that nobody listened.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_class
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Bakunin#Critique_of_Marxism

To a lesser degree Dostoevsky did also. Despite being sort of a caricature, it's astonishing how closely the USSR came to resemble his described theory of the "nihilist state" (a country established with mass murder/purges, where the 90+% would serve as forced labour for the few "revolutionaries").

Shigalyev is a historian and social theorist, the intellectual of Verkhovensky's revolutionary group, who has devised a system for the post-revolution organization of mankind. "My conclusion" he says, "stands in direct contradiction to the idea from which I started. Proceeding from unlimited freedom, I end with unlimited despotism."[49] Ninety percent of society is to be enslaved to the remaining ten percent. Equality of the herd is to be enforced by police state tactics, state terrorism, and destruction of intellectual, artistic, and cultural life. It is estimated that about a hundred million people will need to be killed on the way to the goal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demons_(Dostoevsky_novel)

Marxism's goal was always intended by idle elitists such as Engels and Marx to be an oligarchy where the brain-washed, unintelligent masses would serve the "intelligentsia", a.k.a lazy hedonistic pricks such as themselves, who had a gift for bullshitting (for both of them, their only source of income was their wealthy, hard-working fathers, neither worked a real "working class" job for a day in their lives).

There's a reason why DDR and USSR and other communist countries were filled with pieces of shit like this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavrentiy_Beria#Sexual_predator
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolae_Ceaușescu#Personality_cult_and_totalitarianism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erich_Mielke#Indictments

It's a shame to society that people still haven't figured out this pathetic pyramid scheme which has been run on gullible people so many times, with the exact same results.

Careful bud, @Corn Pop Hombre will come in here ranting about your ignorance in understanding Marxism....



Great post, spot on.

 

[Iron Nick]

you're a moron

you understand exactly 0 about marxism

everything you know about Marx and communism comes from propaganda

we need a dramatic move to the left to turn this country around and there's no denying that

the USA is the worst-off country in ALL of the developed world and our problems are too numerous to count

the US is a corporate fascist militarized state and people like OP and the right have enabled and allowed this to happen

Facts.

America is probably the country with the worst ratio of wealth to education.

Fanatic gun-lovers, anti-vaxxers, flat earth people, people who don't believe in evolution...

All pretty common in the USA.

The Dunning-Kruger effect will prevent the vast majority of these people from acknowledging that though.

 

[feedmelies]

So income inequality is a lie? And there's no such thing as the prison industrial complex, and our govt didn't let big pharma make opioid addicts out of a large portion of our population etc etc. Maybe you can help me understand why our debt to GDP is currently sitting at 107% as we continue to print money and "bail out" private institutions? You're right, everything is fine nothing to see here!

No. Income inequality exists. But not in the way Bernie bros tell it. We are unequal to ourselves over time. Of course we are going to be unequal to others with different skills and ethics.

The rest of your response is a red herring.

 

[feedmelies]

@feedmelies

It's 100% possible for both the rich and poor to get richer, while income equality also increases.

Person A- $100
Person B- $50

Person A- $1,000
Person B- $250

Both people got richer in my example, but the gap between them also increased.

A more accurate description of income inequality in the US would be to say that it has been remarkably stable for the last 25 years.

https://fee.org/articles/americas-r...the-imaginary-hobgoblin-of-income-inequality/

But is it the case that the top 1 percent of the income distribution are the same people year in and year out? Or, for that matter, what about the top 5, 10 and 20 percent? To what extent do everyday Americans experience these levels of affluence, at least some of the time?

In order to answer such questions, Thomas A. Hirschl of Cornell and I looked at 44 years of longitudinal data regarding individuals from ages 25 to 60 to see what percentage of the American population would experience these different levels of affluence during their lives. The results were striking.

It turns out that 12 percent of the population will find themselves in the top 1 percent of the income distribution for at least one year. What’s more, 39 percent of Americans will spend a year in the top 5 percent of the income distribution, 56 percent will find themselves in the top 10 percent, and a whopping 73 percent will spend a year in the top 20 percent of the income distribution.

Yet while many Americans will experience some level of affluence during their lives, a much smaller percentage of them will do so for an extended period of time. Although 12 percent of the population will experience a year in which they find themselves in the top 1 percent of the income distribution, a mere 0.6 percent will do so in 10 consecutive years.

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/20/opinion/sunday/from-rags-to-riches-to-rags.html

 

[feedmelies]

I'm pretty stoked about the spread of marxism. Sorry it ruffles your feathers.

Capitalism breeds socialism. As long as workers are having their labor exploited there will always be those that are dissatisfied with that and will seek alternatives

It sounds like you have no idea what you are talking about.

Have you ever actually studied economics? Actual economics, not Bernie videos.

Socialism is essentially a universal system of price controls. You get shortages of things you want and surpluses of what you don't want. Which leads to widespread suffering, misery, starvation and death. This have been empirically validated. It requires tremendous feats of intellectual dishonesty and mental gymnastics to truly believe in and defend socialism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_controls