Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

[pErvinalia]

Yeah, that too. Although, Lenin was the logical progression that lead to Stalin, IMO.

[FBM]

I'm pretty sure it would've gone in a very different direction had Lenin lived long enough.

[pErvinalia]

Lenin was elitist and fairly brutal. It's no surprise an authoritarian dictatorship emerged out of that sort of fertile ground.

[Hermit]

Everything is Marxism, Eff.

I was getting at the fact that Marx's model didn't include draconian authoritarian rule.

The necessity of a brutally, mercilessly violent overthrow of capitalism and "the Dictatorship of the Proletariat" don't count?

[Seth]

Everything is Marxism, Eff.

I was getting at the fact that Marx's model didn't include draconian authoritarian rule.

Yes it does. (Marxism is not past-tense unfortunately) Go read the Communist Manifesto sometime.

[FBM]

Everything is Marxism, Eff.

I was getting at the fact that Marx's model didn't include draconian authoritarian rule.

The necessity of a brutally, mercilessly violent overthrow of capitalism and "the Dictatorship of the Proletariat" don't count?

"Violent" doesn't entail "brutal" or "merciless." A revolution would be the result of the numerically superior (by far) people who would want to change the system. Violence would be (most likely) inevitable because the corporate overlords and, hence, their pets, teh gummits, would attempt to suppress the majority will, not because the proletariats would be blood-thirsty savages.

[FBM]

Everything is Marxism, Eff.

I was getting at the fact that Marx's model didn't include draconian authoritarian rule.

Yes it does. (Marxism is not past-tense unfortunately) Go read the Communist Manifesto sometime.

What part of "stateless" do you not get? According to Engels, once the revolution is complete, the state will become superfluous, as people will govern themselves. To quote Engels, "It dies out."

[JimC]

Everything is Marxism, Eff.

I was getting at the fact that Marx's model didn't include draconian authoritarian rule.

Yes it does. (Marxism is not past-tense unfortunately) Go read the Communist Manifesto sometime.

What part of "stateless" do you not get? According to Engels, once the revolution is complete, the state will become superfluous, as people will govern themselves. To quote Engels, "It dies out."

However, I think this was spin by the architects of early communist thought, either through naive idealism, or cynical design. The revolutionary process they outlined was inevitably going to lead to authoritarian rule and excessive loss of freedom (for all other than the party elite).

[FBM]

However, I think this was spin by the architects of early communist thought, either through naive idealism, or cynical design. The revolutionary process they outlined was inevitably going to lead to authoritarian rule and excessive loss of freedom (for all other than the party elite).

Well, I just finished doing some reading in The German Ideology (Marx and Engels) and Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (Engels), and that's not what's described therein.

[Hermit]

"Violent" doesn't entail "brutal" or "merciless."

Why do the anti-authoritarians not confine themselves to crying out against political authority, the state? All Socialists are agreed that the political state, and with it political authority, will disappear as a result of the coming social revolution, that is, that public functions will lose their political character and will be transformed into the simple administrative functions of watching over the true interests of society. But the anti-authoritarians demand that the political state be abolished at one stroke, even before the social conditions that gave birth to it have been destroyed. They demand that the first act of the social revolution shall be the abolition of authority. Have these gentlemen ever seen a revolution? A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means, if such there be at all; and if the victorious party does not want to have fought in vain, it must maintain this rule by means of the terror which its arms inspire in the reactionists. On Authority

Let the ruling classes tremble at a communist revolution. The Communist Manifesto

This should suffice to support my assertion, but if not, more quotes along those lines coming straight from the writings of Marx an Engels are easy enough to find. The Marx & Engels Internet Archive is a good place to start, and there are plenty of others providing primary sources devoid of editorial comments and distortions.

[FBM]

Aw, shucks. What's a little terrorism among comrades?

Thanks for that, Hermit. That was very informative.

[pErvinalia]

Everything is Marxism, Eff.

I was getting at the fact that Marx's model didn't include draconian authoritarian rule.

Yes it does. (Marxism is not past-tense unfortunately) Go read the Communist Manifesto sometime.

What part of "stateless" do you not get? According to Engels, once the revolution is complete, the state will become superfluous, as people will govern themselves. To quote Engels, "It dies out."

Seth can't distinguish between the theory and what the outcome has mostly been so far. It's a usual problem for the politically ignorant. Marx quite simply, as you said, was for a large scale stateless communist system. The revolutionary Marxists and Leninist have all sorts of reasons for why that didn't come to pass, and they are undoubtedly right in some of those cases. The other way to look at it is that it's an ongoing battle. Anyone who thinks that overthrow of an inherently violent system is going to be achieved without violence is naive. My personal view is that capitalism and the greed and selfishness it engenders in people are too far ingrained for there to be a simple one off revolution and then communist utopia. There is a chance it could happen one day, but that day is a LONG way off, and I think we'd need to go through periods of chaos and then most likely rule by criminal gangs before we could hope to lose that in-built capitalistic inertia. Although, having said that, a period of chaos and then rule by fear from criminal gangs would likely just reinforce the selfishness phenomenon.

Ultimately, I'm pretty fucking pessimistic.

[Svartalf]

However, I think this was spin by the architects of early communist thought, either through naive idealism, or cynical design. The revolutionary process they outlined was inevitably going to lead to authoritarian rule and excessive loss of freedom (for all other than the party elite).

Well, I just finished doing some reading in The German Ideology (Marx and Engels) and Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (Engels), and that's not what's described therein.

Stateless communism is all in one word of the title : Utopian.

[JimC]

However, I think this was spin by the architects of early communist thought, either through naive idealism, or cynical design. The revolutionary process they outlined was inevitably going to lead to authoritarian rule and excessive loss of freedom (for all other than the party elite).

Well, I just finished doing some reading in The German Ideology (Marx and Engels) and Socialism: Utopian and Scientific (Engels), and that's not what's described therein.

It's more pragmatic than that; in every case where an old left model has been tried, the consequences have been disastrous...

[SnowLeopard]

What taxes? Or, more accurately, "which taxes?" I only pay taxes for the things I use. I don't pay taxes that are used for individual redistributionary purposes.

Really. How do you manage that. Do you not pay income tax. If not, could you explain what your situation is that you don't.

In the UK we have VAT Value Added Tax. Do you not have a similar system in America? Sales tax or some gubbins is it not. Do you not buy gasoline. Do you not buy any food, or groceries, pet food, dog food.

If that is the case that you manage to not do any of those things, dafuq you bitching about all the time?

Not submitting to extortion.

It's not extortion it's, you know, following the law.

Would you be a little more specific, my dear.

Try to flesh out your argument with, like, an argument.

For example in world war one you had conscientious objectors and people like the Quakers who stood up for their belief that fighting was wrong. Actually stood by their convictions of what they believed in and refused to fight, despite the almost complete ostracisation and contempt from other members of the comminity that came with it. That sort of conviction must take some balls, don't you agree?

Now it seems to me that with libertarians being so venomously anti-tax as they are, so sure of their righteousness over all other people, continue to roll over and pay that tax...? It must take a special kind of spineless, gutless, weak willed, lily liverd pussy. A person completely lacking in all testicular fortitude do not stand up for such, allegedly, strongly held beliefs...

Sounds a lot like you're describing yourself.

That was a disappointing retort. You must be getting tired in your old age.