Communism good or bad?

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#21

What do you propose to do to get rid of the fundamental nature of humans - genetically engineer us?
Yes. I agree that simply useing propaganda will never work and is a dumb idea.
I hate myself for how religious and like a madman(if there is a difference :lol:) I will sound, but I do think that people will do anything for this “better good” once they see things my way. GenEng is the only way that this will happen, so I say, “Screw ethics, they were made by people who value one life or fetus that will only live for a short time (usualy <100 years) over the good of our race.”
Sorry for the misunderstanding about the Nazi’s, your veiw is now known.

BTW, just so that you know how flawed my views are, I am 14. :stuck_out_tongue: And no, I was not dropped on my head when I was younger. :lol:

#22

OK, you’re 14. When I was that age, I explored all kinds of political philosophies across both ends of the spectrum. At one time communism sounded sensible, at another time fascism, and then almost every point in-between.

Then I grew up & discovered that things like what you’re saying are completely unrealistic, and will never happen - in fact, what you’ve described sounds like a plot for a dystopian future film with elements of Brave New World in it.

A far more sensible place to come up with such suggestions is the barking moonbat forum Urban75 http://www.urban75.com/. They’re full of loons that will tolerate any ridiculous viewpoint, as long as it’s left-wing. Expect to find Communist-style arguments (start with the conclusion & denounce all evidence to the contrary - if this doesn’t work, denounce the poster), untenable positions, and much barking moonbattery (e.g. 9/11 was justified cos it was against Capitalists and America). Good for a laugh, but it puts your blood-pressure up if you spend too long in there.

#23

Thanks for the site :lol: I know that I will eventualy grow out of the ideas that I have now, and I hope that I don’t go through a Fascism phase. One reason for my optismism for the future and my love for GenEng and all things cyborg and what-not, is that I am an Extropian/Transhumanist. Yet another fanstasy world, but it has much more merit than Communism does. I am more into this beleif than Communism, and hope that I remain this type of cyberpunk, unlikely though it may be.

Well, thats about enough of that soul searching, back to the topic: What I hope that happens with Communism is that it will lay dorment for a long time, a few realy intellegent people working out the many kinks in Communism, and when space travel becomes ordinary, and we colonize other worlds comfertably, we designate a section of the galaxy to the development of Communism. This would be for those who would freely go, or we could breed a geneticaly altered Communist race while on the way there, just to see what would happen. If it fails, too bad, Communism will never work and a bunch of geneticaly altered race of humans is now extinct, but hey, we got a ton of worlds that are ready for Capitalists to move to! This will not happen for a very long time, if at all. That is my thought.

#24

Okay, alright… :roll:

“iron out the many kinks”, eh? Like most of it?

My wife has thought that your idea is very interesting as a basis for a short story about a dystopian future based on genetically engineering communists in the manner which you suggest :smiley:

#25

glad to be of service. :smiley: If it isn’t a problem, mind if I read the draft for that story if she writes it? :slight_smile: And yes, a complete reformating of Communism would be neccisary before it is ‘practicle’, that is why realy intellegent people would rewrite the Manifesto for the eaons before civillian colonization of the galaxy is possible.

#26

I have somewhat complex views on Communism. On the one hand I do think that in its simplest form as I understand it (i.e. “From each according to his abilities, to each according to his need”), it is a brilliant concept. If it were as simple as that and if it were implemented in that manner and if people did not just look out for number one, it could be made to work very well.

However, every single person in the world is, essentially, greedy and will, if necessary, do whatever it takes to come out on top of the pile. There are people with genuinely altruistic tendencies but they are few and far between. As far as I am concerned everything we do is done to benefit ourselves in some manner. Even acts that appear to not be self serving tend to benefit the individual in making him or her feel better in some way.

One very good way of looking at this is the theory that we are all driven by the desire to further our genetic lineage. If you think of every act, good or bad in these terms, life makes a lot more sense.

For example, a father dying in the process of saving his children’s life could be said to be ensuring that his genes continue, even if he will not. Dying while childless to save someone unrelated to you is not ensuring the continuation of your genetic line, and could therefore be seen as a less successful strategy.

There are people that have done these things and I feel that they are so highly prized and lauded for their selflessness and willingness to die for someone else’s sake because they are such a rare commodity and I applaud anyone who shows them self to be that much less selfish than me!

A very cynical view maybe, but it’s working OK for me at the moment.

As for the suggestion that, as human nature is the issue that prevents Communism, we can breed people to live better under this system; I find this preposterous! If we get rid of human nature we cease to be human. By definition, it is human nature that raises us above the level of animals. All we would be creating is a breed of cattle with only two legs. It is human nature (and all the emotions, jealousies and other foibles) that leads to us wanting to better ourselves. If we were to get rid of this mankind would instantly become stagnant and (I believe) rapidly die off.

Apologies for the length of the post and if any of the content offends anyone, I don’t really care!

(BTW if you really want to get me going - start a thread on creationism versus evolution.).

Tubs

#27

Provided that all people are rewarded fairly for what they contribute to society surely the sort of imbalance and oppresion that communism sought to remove can be achieved.

Starting from a position of ignorance in which you cannot foresee your own position in society surely this is one of the few ways to ensure individual contribution to the state and subsequently a strong state capable of supporting the needs of the individual/

views please…

#28

What you’re really describing is a meritocracy - it’s only fair that those with more merit (i.e. skills, abilities etc) should be rewarded proportionate to those skills, otherwise there is no incentive to gain skills & training and better yourself and use your skills to the benfit of society. If I were to be paid the same doing a job requiring no skills & no ability, I would have got a degree & would not be doing the job I’m doing now - I’d be doing the simplest thing possible to the worst standard possible. However, communists think that meritocracy is unfair, since some people are born more able than others, and they wish for some kind of equality of outcome (which in my book is incredibly unfair & leads to the problems mentioned above).

I personally do not like the idea of a strong state, since that invariably leads to tyranny. IMHO, the majority of individuals are best capable of supporting their own needs.

#29

Stoatman,

Unchecked capitalism will also lead to a tyranny, in this case a plutocracy (laws made by the rich for the rich). This is one thing where Marx’s analysis was correct. There is a trend from multiple capitalism (lots of competing businesses) through oligo capitalism to monopolistic capitalism. You can see it e.g. in the way Microsoft, though they don’t have the technically best product, used their power on the markets to destroy smaller competitors. Once the competition is gone and they have the market cornered, they will inflate their prices. If this trend is being unchecked you’ll have all of a nation’s means pf production in the hands of a small minority. This is what happened during the late 19th century (look at the American robber barons of this time) and caused anti trust legislation to be introduced.

I think a middle way between state capitalism (communism) and pure capitalism is necessary. You need capitalist elements to nuture ambition. Without it the society will not progress. On the other hand, you’ll have to provide some minimum protection for those who fall through the net.
Else we still would have child labour.
This is the big thing where Marx erred. He thought that the consequence of unchecked capitalism, as it ruled during the early to mid 19th century, would be a revolution of the working class. First, he didn’t see the development of skilled, educated blue collar workers compared to the lumpenproletariat, he didn’t figure that there would be a reformist labour movement (opposed to the revolutionary one), like the social democrats opposed to the communists, and that both government and entrepreneurs would realise that, to continue their business they had to improve living conditions for the workers. In Germany most big late 19th century industrial barons (Siemens, Krupp, Borsig etc.) where very strict towards their workers, but in a paternal way. They spent considerable amounts to improve the living standards for their workers by e.g. building decent housing areas. They realised that they could only make a profit if they had peace in their factories, and this required reasonably happy workers. Also, the archreactionary Bismarck pushed through a revolutionary social security system, partially carried by the employers, which gave basic protection to workers in case of invalidity, illness and old age (unemployment was added later after the economic crisis in the 1920s with mass unemployment). This took the wind out of the sails of the revolutionaries.

Also, left and right describes only economic models (state capitalism versus private capitalism). It doesn’t say anything about if a state will be authoritarian or liberal.
E.g. Pinochet’s Chile was ultra capitalist (he got his ideas from the school of the Chicago Boys), but extremely authoritarian. Anybody who dared to openly disagree tended to disappear.
On the other hand the Anarcho-Syndicalists of Spain during the Spanish civil war were strictly communist in their economic ideology (collectivation of means of production on village or town level), but very liberal in social affairs.
(Liberal is defined here in the European Libertarian way).

Jan

#30

You are right (Man of Stoat), the abilities that humans posses are very different, and so we are not all equal. It would not be fair to implement a Communist government because there is no way to fairly run said government. Luckily for us, GenEng rides to the rescue again! The fantasy race that I described earlier, or a similar race sent to another part of the galaxy, could be geneticaly altered even more so that everyone had the same traits and abilities. I know, you are probably thinking, “Why would anyone want that, there would be no individual, no me!” As with many good things, there must be sacrifices! It is alot to ask, but look at how siccessful it would be. we could become the most efficient race, albeit, we wouldn’t know it, but it would be true! and if we just do this to a small portion of humanity that have no will to do otherwise, no problem!
(I apologize if this doen’t make sense, I am in a Computer tech class and we get short breaks. It’s very hard to continue just one train of thought going over a long time under these circumstances :wink: )

#31

CERT,

When you’ve descended back to earth from Planet Zog or wherever your genetically-engineered communists come from, you’ll be sure to tell me, right?

Now, back to serious matters:

If everybody is engineered to be equal, what will happen is one of these:

  1. Everyone is engineered to be average, thus there will be no scientific, artistic or other breakthroughs, since these never come about through average people.
  2. Everyone is engineered to be a genius. This leads to the problem that there will nobody to do blue-collar work, clean toilets, empty bins, operate machines etc. Management theorists worked out a long time ago that you had to match the person to the job. An IQ of 150 pushing a wheelbarrow will be deeply depressed & will work slowly, an IQ 50 doing the same job may be as happy as a pig in muck. You would thus then have to force people to do these jobs, which will make them very unhappy.

Your ideas are great fodder for a dystopian future book, but if you’re really taking them seriously, you really need to get out more. Read Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World” for a genetically-engineered dystopian future - although they engineered people into “classes” from Alpha to Gamma, since it’s necessary to have a mix of abilities to do all the jobs a society requires.

#32

Curse your ever-present logic! You make a very good point, or points rather. It is true that if everyone was very smart and equal, no one would want to do the mind-numbing tasks that we rely upon, and if everyone was less intellegent and equal, no one would make intellegent break throughs. So once again I call upon the imaginative power of Genetic Engineering! Everyone would be hyper-intellegent, and so some would be programed to see the logic in the fact that someone has to do the dull jobs, and they would be made to think that it was an honor to clean toleits! And to avoid these being laughed at, the others, those in charge of intellegent thinking, would see the logic in the others needing to think that they are special and looked up-to. So in other words, the masses must be lied to inorder to be happy. Either that or everyone would take shifts and would be programed to be happy with all of their jobs by seeing the efficeincy in this system. :stuck_out_tongue:
Another point that you were right on was that I do not get out much, and probably should, but, whatever… :smiley:

#33

Please, please search out a copy of “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley (as Stoaty already mentioned). Quite apart from being rather a good book, it goes over exactly this ground, and does so rather well.

#34

I’ll be sure to read that. If more than one person recomends I read something, I assume that it has merit.

#35

Some countries are born to be capitalist, depending on the resources the country has and what the rules they abide by, but some countries like “Russia” were born to be Communist.
Russia was a growing society after the second world war, powerful, producing and proud.
I think the U.S.A were worried of the immense power the Soviet Union was gathering to after WW2 and were scared themselves that their society was actually working.
You dont hear much of the Russian Federation these days, because they have deceased in all those things i said above, power, producing and proud people of the country.
If you look at China, that country is heading to be the World Power, I mean the U.S.A cant be the world police forever, just like the Romans had their time, and so did the english, nothing lasts forever, a new country will rise up and it would of been the U.S.S.R if the communist ideal didn’t fall, now it falls into the hands of the Chinese.

#36

And some countries (example Romania :smiley: ) are born for what???
Without “Big Brother” from East we would be today like Belgium or Holland.

#37

Russia was born to be feudalist - Russian communism was feudalism by another name, with the old aristocracy replaced by the party apparatus, and the tsar by the “red tsar”.

No country was born to follow a flawed & unnatural political and economic theory, otherwise it would have developed earlier.

#38

This is the same I noticed concerning today’s China. The nomenclatura has taken over the position of the old imperial court and government, with communist propaganda about equality just being used as a windowdressing to appease the masses. In fact, I see the PRC at the moment as an example of a 19th century cut throat capitalism. I also see attempts to regain the sphere of influence imperial China had up to the mid 19th century.

Jan

#39

CERT, have you by any chance read some of Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels?
The Culture has some of the elements that you write about, such as a heavily GM population (life expectancy 300+, at will gender change, endogenous drug glands) living in a highly socialistic cvilisation with a planned economy and a universal standard of living. However this only works because all of the work, planning and thinking in general is done by machines controled by hyper-intelligent AI Minds. The human population lives in idle and luxurious leisure, but only because they have no control over the civilisation itself and because it is so vastly materialy and technologicaly rich that humans are an economic irrelevance.

#40

There is no arguement about it, if the U.S.S.R has stayed Communist they would of suceeded in becoming the world power.
Doing the Russian Revolution they actually used and recycled the earths resources aswell as take care of their land and plan out the area they will be constructing on before they build.
All that communism needed was to be altered a bit, as in more food, free choice of religeon and so forth.