Cowbee @ Cowbee @lemm.ee

This town, in fact, has more than enough room for the two of us

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2 yr. ago

Engineers designing production lines absolutely get fucked over with horrible working conditions. Unions benefit every single position workers fill.

I guarantee you've never known an Engineer in manufacturing.

My point wasn't that co-ops aren't allowed. Your point was that co-operative ownership struggles with instability, and therefore would inevitably result in starvation, which is 100% false as proven by me. Moving the goal post doesn't make you correct, it makes you wrong.

There are no leftist Capitalists, that's an oxymoron. Leftism is inherently anti-capitalist, and therefore what you likely are hinting at, Social Democracy, is a center-right ideology that is still riddled with issues. It's certainly better than American Capitalism, but it does away with none of the core issues with Capitalism, it only makes them slightly more tolerable. Socialists have been learning and adapting theory ever since Socialism was founded, it hasn't stagnated in any way.

I'm on a leftist platform created by a Communist as a direct leftist alternative to Reddit because I believe in the principles of leftist organizational structure, such as a rejection of the profit motive, collective ownership, and decentralization of control.

Why is co-operative farming inflexible to shocks and instability? Wouldn't it be more stable if the group can react democratically, rather than depend on several competing mini-dictators to not price-gouge and take advantage of instability for profit? I'm not just talking off of vibes, here, Worker Co-operatives, ie collective ownership of business, are shown to be far more resistant to economic shocks and more adaptable than Capitalist entities: https://www.aspeninstitute.org/blog-posts/building-and-sustaining-worker-cooperatives-in-the-us/

The USSR and Maoist China were developing countries just coming out of revolution, and both the Russian Federation and modern PRC remain developing countries. France was also highly unstable following the French Revolution, and became headed by Napolean, one of history's most famous dictators. Pretending decentralization is purely to blame, rather than instability leading to centralization, is a weak point to make.

Why do you believe that no Leftist has attempted to learn from the mistakes of previous Socialist systems? That's incredibly wrong, modern leftist discourse is oriented around how to achieve Worker Ownership in modern society, and avoid the problems that have plagued previous Socialist systems.

All in all, why are you on a leftist, decentralized site like Lemmy, if you hate Socialism so much? It's interesting to see such cognitive dissonance, if you like Capitalism, then there's Reddit.

I don't hate competition for the sake of competition. The goal of FOSS is cooperation until something becomes less than desirable, as the goal is a good product. With Capitalism, the goal is profit, and as such destabilization and competition are required. With FOSS, a new fork is only done for a better product, not for profit-seeking.

Commercial exploitation of an anti-Capitalist option does not mean the option is not anti-Capitalist. FOSS is a rejection of IP a la Capitalism, and a rejection of the profit motive.

I understand that trying to argue with sound logic is difficult for you, after all, nothing you've said has logically followed. Enough of being cheeky, though. The USSR was a specific model of Marxist-Leninist Socialism, they never reached Communism as Communism is a Stateless, Classless, moneyless society. They did many things right, like giving workers far more control, and providing free Healthcare and education. They also had many huge problems, like massive corruption at the Politburo level, and atrocities committed by government officials like the Katyn Massacre and Stalin's Purges. As such, I believe the USSR provides a wealth of information on what aspects did work, and what aspects were terrible. I do not want to recreate the USSR, nor use it as a template. I want to learn from it and create something far better.

You're confusing market competition for Capitalism. Capitalism requires competition and rejects cooperation, Socialism has both when it needs to. Capitalism cannot function without competition.

I understand that leftist theory can be hard to understand if you aren't at all familiar. I suggest reading leftist theory before trying to talk about it on social media as though you're saying something profound. It only comes off as profoundly ignorant.

It's true that people would be paid more for their labor, it's false to equate that to underproducing food. You're attaching mysticism to your claim, as though it's inevitable that starvation would happen unless you have a Capitalist brutally exploiting workers and still having starvation despite food being literally thrown away. Co-operative farming exists and has existed in stable manners for the vast majority of human existence, and this is even easier as industrialization improves.

There are no "other options" for Socialism beyond Worker Ownership of the Means of Production. That is Socialism. If you mean there are other models than Marxism-Leninism, then of course, I'm not an ML myself. I'm anti-tendency and think each country has unique circumstances that will result in different paths to worker ownership, perhaps Syndicalism, or Market Socialism, or Council Communism, etc.

Whether the corporation is owned by a single Capitalist or several, the fact that the Workers have exactly no say and the Capitalists have all of the say remains the problem.

On what grounds do you think that it's worse for Workers to democratically control production, rather than a class of owners?

Do you think crops care about who shares ownership of them, and kill themselves if they are shared, rather than owned by 1 dude that employs other people to harvest it?

Lemmy is a decentralized, FOSS platform built by a Communist explicitly as an answer to Reddit. The people on Lemmy trend leftward, obviously, but that's because the very foundation is a rejection of Capitalism. If you want Capitalist Lemmy, there's Reddit.

FOSS itself is leftist, and a rejection of Capitalism. The ability for the users to simply fork off if they don't like the way something is heading is precisely an advantage of leftist organization, which is impossible with Capitalist Reddit.

Truth Social and Gab are built on Mastadon, yes. FOSS itself is a rejection of Capitalism, Capitalists going in and taking advantage of existing leftist infrastructure doesn't mean the infrastructure itself is Capitalist.

Your last paragraph is a complete non-sequitor. Much of the USSR was indeed a failure, there was a ludicrous amount of corruption at the Politburo level, and the further up you went the less democratic it was, as only local Soviets were purely democratically accountable to the Workers. With each rung you went up, it was less accountable to the Workers. However, absolutely none of what you say about competition, the USSR, or otherwise follows logically.

Communism itself doesn't depend on everyone following in lock-step, Capitalism does.

When has Clarence Thomas ever done the right thing? When do people think he will ever act properly under pressure?

Why friend shape if not friend?

There are legitimately people here arguing that just because you don't understand the language, you probably aren't a fascist for liking clearly fascist music that you have to work hard to find, especially if you don't natively speak the language.

Pumped Up Kicks is explicit satire, not an actual call for school shootings.

Let me ask this: what makes more sense, a random, specifically Japanese group of people, enjoys northern European Neo-Nazi music for the tunes? Or, perhaps, the fact that Japan has legitimate fascist movements, and historical ties to fascism without heavily denouncing them like Germany, means fascists are likely to search out more fascist music?

I understand your point, but it's incredibly hard to just randomly stumble upon fascist music and enjoy it for the vibes. This is a specific level of dedication in a country with higher than normal levels of support for fascism.

Japan literally has rising fascist movements that want to bring back Imperial Japan, I think it's fair to say that they know what they're listening to.

This might surprise you, but Japan has very close ties with fascism. Ever seen the Japanese flag with the rays coming from the center red sun? That's the flag of Imperial Japan, a fascist terror that scarred much of Asia. Japan refuses to denounce their war crimes, and there are an unfortunate number of reactionary fascists who use the flag of Imperial Japan as a symbol they support.

I'm absolutely not saying that every Japanese person is a fascist, not even close. I am, however, saying that I'm fairly confident that these particular Japanese fans are aware of the Nazi ideology of the bands they listen to, and listen precisely because of that.

I certainly wouldn't listen to Neo-Nazi music no matter how nice the tunes are, because I personally couldn't stand supporting literal fucking Nazis and listening to Nazi bullshit.

It's not like the Nazis are the only ones making music, there are countless good, leftist bands out there. There aren't slim pickings, there are oceans of good music out there.

No, in a real free market the banks would lobby to be bailed out. Removing even more regulation from it would result in more lobbying. Even with anti-corruption measures, without worker ownership or massive Unionization, eventually these protections will slide back once someone more opportunistic takes office.

Worker Ownerhship and decentralization are the correct path, rather than antidemocratic Capitalist production.

Because the Workers aren't competing, they don't give a shit. The Capitalists are competing for an even larger share of the pie. Instead of everyone cooperating, you fragment everyone into companies, which are like little factions.

Some factions doing well enough to create new kings like Bezos or Musk is also not a feature, given that there's no democratic control.

Really not sure what you're getting at. Why are you even on a platform rejecting Capitslism, rather than Reddit, if you're so sure that leftism is a bad thing?

Political systems don't determine quality of life nearly as much as development.

Your second point isn't correct, anyone could be voted on. They couldn't vote on the next level, only their representative could. I'm not sure where you get this new idea from.

If you're talking about the Politburo, yes, and that's part of my problem with it. But, at the local level, you voted on whoever you wanted, then your rep votes on who they want, and so forth. There were lots of shady deals that solidified power higher up, yes, but the process was Democratic in nature, even if highly flawed.

Fallout 4 was even worse, that's kind of a point I raise, that Bethesda has been riding the coattails of better lore. There are dumb fetch quests in every Bethesda game.

... what do you think Communism is? It's a Stateless, Classless, Moneyless society achieved via abolition of Private Property. That doesn't mean everyone suddenly becomes hippies working in communes or tribes.

Capitalism certainly can have cooperation, it just happens to encourage competition, monopoly, and exploitation of Workers for the sake of profit.

What's your point, exactly?

The Germans working under codetermination also have it far better than Germans under the Kaiser. Comparing a 21st century first world developed nation with a 20th century developing country sure is a win, I guess?

Secondly, although the beurocracy was incredibly corrupt, the Soviet Democracy by which local Soviets reported to higher Soviets that reported to higher Soviets was fundamentally democratic, even if flawed.

I don't really think you've said much of anything. The Soviet form of Democracy was indeed flawed, but it was still Democratic, and I think it's obvious to anyone that living in a modern developed country would be better than living in a developing country from last century.