Means of production; Except anyone in a true free society (not the Statism we have now) anyone can produce value for someone else to buy, asks others to help out (or not)...
In a free society, there are only voluntary exchange of goods and services, not theft, coercion, violence, kidnapping and murder, like (I presume!) you are advocating in form of Socialism/Communism.
Instead of demanding the State to steal for you; Start a commune, labor-owned means of production and so on
>>...not theft, coercion, violence, kidnapping and murder, like (I presume!) you are advocating in form of Socialism/Communism.<<
Why would you presume this? If you had just taken a quick look at the profile of the person you're replying to you would see information that contradicts this presumption. It may or may not make sense to you but it should be a clue to lead you to questions, maybe about some of your own assumptions and adopted narratives.
I mean right there in their pinned toot it explains that they believe in "rejection of both state authority and class distinctions" and "a stateless, classless society where the means of production are collectively owned and managed by the community through direct democracy, voluntary association, and decentralized decision-making."
Maybe don't be so quick to presume, at least if you're actually engaging in good faith.
I try to engage in good faith. And no Socialist/Communist ever have explained how their proposed system can work without State Violence.
Scenario; Community owns means of production. I start making hand-made shoes. Are the tools I create mine, or will they be stolen? At which point does "personal property" (stuff that isn't taken by others) becomes "community property"?
How to enforce that? Coercion? No, then how?
All such details are never mentioned.
@niclas @Radical_EgoCom @passenger
You can keep your tools. But if you're an asshole about it, there will probably be consequences.
Well, at some point those tools might make me wealthier, and you are no longer in the class-less society that you aspire so much.
"being an asshole"; Does providing value, by mutually voluntary exchange of goods and services, to others considered "being an asshole"? Because that is how the vast majority of capitalist enterprise is conducted today.
@niclas @Radical_EgoCom @passenger
I'm not going to indulge your fantasy version of capitalism.
@RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @passenger
The problem isn't that capitalism or communism are good or bad. Both function perfectly fine in small egalitarian situations. The problem is in scale. They scale differently but ultimately result in the same issue of wealth disparity.
Without an answer to "how does this work at scale with evil people throughout the system" the whole discussion is moot.
@shadowsonawall @Radical_EgoCom @passenger
The emergent system that has been named capitalism was always a global system and could never have existed without state and colonialism. It did not scale up from small egalitarian situations, it was forced upon and destroyed such situations.
The problem is that capitalism is bad.
@RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @passenger in some places that happened with capitalism, in some places it happened with communism, in some places it happened with theocracy. The issue isn't in the government type. It's with people who actively *want* to exploit other people for their own personal benefit.
@shadowsonawall @RD4Anarchy @passenger
This never happened with Communism. I assume you're referring to countries like the Soviet Union, which did not achieve Communism in it's existence, nor did any of the other similar countries. The Soviet Unions' economy in particular was state capitalist with a strong Socialist leaning, but it wasn't Communist.
@Radical_EgoCom@mastodon.social @shadowsonawall@qoto.org @RD4Anarchy@kolektiva.social @passenger@kolektiva.social communism literally says there has to be no state
it's a stateless, classless society
@graphite @Radical_EgoCom @passenger @RD4Anarchy which is literally impossible in the face of evil people who actively want to exploit other people.
@shadowsonawall @graphite @passenger @RD4Anarchy
It's not literally impossible. There are other means to deal with evil people without a state or centralized authority, like the method of using a decentralized organization.
@Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger @RD4Anarchy oh? How would you deal with evil people without a state?
@shadowsonawall @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger
State has never been about dealing with "evil people". State has always been a tool of exploitation and control by a ruling elite. Your question makes no sense.
@RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger we agree that there are evil people? How do you handle them in a system that scales past neighbors?
@shadowsonawall @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger
Why does there have to be *a system* that scales past neighbors?
"Evil people" was your characterization, I don't usually think in those terms. But for sure there will be some assholes. I believe there would be far fewer assholes if we were liberated from capitalism, but there would still be some, sure.
Anyway, I could point you to various techniques societies have used for millennia but I don't have the patience to listen to bad faith bullshit about me wanting us to go back to hunter-gatherer days.
@RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger I'm not trying to act in bad faith. I'm trying to help you understand the limits of what you are advocating for. We don't have to continue the discussion but if you do think about it further understand that evil isn't always about the environment/system people are in. There are a ton of people who are naturally selfish, plenty who naturally believe they are superior to others. That's a reality of our tribal biology and it has played out throughout history under every yet conceived economic system to one end: people crushing other people for their own benefit.
@passenger @RD4Anarchy @shadowsonawall @Radical_EgoCom @graphite
Of course everyone is naturally selfish. Everyone is also naturally pro social. Neither of these facts contradicts each other or predetermined a particular social outcome.
@HeavenlyPossum @passenger @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite I totally agree: we are all both selfish and egalitarian. Egalitarian when it comes to "our family" (loosely defined), selfish when it comes to those outside it. The result of those pressures is well, history. And it's not particularly pretty :(
If people were only prosocially egalitarian among their own families, humans would have gone extinct 300,000 years ago. We are obligate social animals, and humans have built countless societies in which members are—for quite self-serving reasons—cooperative and egalitarian.
@HeavenlyPossum @passenger @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite 'family' may have been the wrong word, apologies. Tribes, maybe? Think of the hardcore MAGA crowd in the united states. They are a tribe acting selfishly and for their own benefit, crushing any who stand in the way of that. They are also comfortable cutting anyone out of the tribe should that individual act against the dictated presets of the tribe. This is human, this is an actionable transition. I personally don't like where it's going but it is the kind of mechanism I was thinking of.
Odds are that you already perform communism in your daily life with total strangers.
@HeavenlyPossum @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @graphite @passenger
@happycoyote12
No doubt I probably do perform communism in my daily life with total strangers but, and apologies Coyote (he has a reply asking for personal funding if you are interested), I won't be in what is a critical need from a stranger. I have to live with my own selfishness, distasteful as it may be, as I try to make decisions that will most benefit me and my own. Offensive as it may be personally, though a hell of a mic drop Coyote, "the poor will always be among us" is a reality we must all navigate.
> “I won't be in what is a critical need from a stranger.”
We are constantly in critical need from strangers.
> “I have to live with my own selfishness, distasteful as it may be, as I try to make decisions that will most benefit me and my own.”
Why would communism be incompatible with your selfishness?
> “" the poor will always be among us" is a reality we must all navigate.
Poverty is a social relationship, not material deprivation, and is in no sense universal or permanent.
@RD4Anarchy @passenger @graphite @happycoyote12 @Radical_EgoCom
@HeavenlyPossum
"Why would communism be incompatible with your selfishness?"
> Because I am a vile creature and am willing to let others suffer when doing so increases the likelihood that myself and those I care about, in an intimate personal sense, will not.
"Poverty is a social relationship, not material deprivation, and is in no sense universal or permanent."
> But acutely present and not something I've yet heard a way to actually deal with, given that I'm not particularly unique in the above.
@RD4Anarchy @passenger @graphite @happycoyote12 @Radical_EgoCom
@HeavenlyPossum @shadowsonawall @passenger @RD4Anarchy @happycoyote12 @graphite
Because Communism is built off of mutual aid, solidarity, and voluntary cooperation. Someone who is so selfish that they choose not to help those who aren't in their immediate circle of friends or loved ones would be very out of place in a Communist society, one where helping those who you may not know or benefit from in any way will likely be a regular occurrence.
@HeavenlyPossum @shadowsonawall @happycoyote12 @passenger @iska@catposter.club @kirby@lab.nyanide.com @RD4Anarchy @graphite
No, Max Stirner was not a Communist. He was an individualist anarchist and rejected political ideologies like Communism.
@shadowsonawall @graphite @Radical_EgoCom @passenger @happycoyote12 @RD4Anarchy
He rejected the formalism of communism—a spook!—but ended up in the same place. Someone once described his philosophy as a sort of communist Buddhism and I felt like that was particularly apt.
A collection of individuals seeking to maximize their individual self-interest among equal peers will naturally tend towards communism, effectively it not formally.
@HeavenlyPossum @shadowsonawall @graphite @passenger @happycoyote12 @RD4Anarchy
Max Stirner criticized Communism in "The Ego and Its Own." One notable quote expressing his disdain is: "Communism, by the abolition of all personal property, only presses me back still more into dependence on another, namely, on the generality or collectivity."
@graphite @RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @shadowsonawall @passenger @happycoyote12
Yes. Stirner thought that all property and all formal systems of organization were conceptual prisons and advocated for people to supersede spooks like these. His proposed union of egoists has more in common with the end goals of anarchist communism.
@lina @HeavenlyPossum @RD4Anarchy @passenger @sysrq @Radical_EgoCom @shadowsonawall
i think that guy never lived in the soviet union
neither did you
@lina @HeavenlyPossum @RD4Anarchy @passenger @sysrq @Radical_EgoCom @shadowsonawall i don't trust either you or them so it's your loss
", — he said with teary eyes
@lina @HeavenlyPossum @RD4Anarchy @passenger @sysrq @Radical_EgoCom @shadowsonawall
@happycoyote12 @graphite @shadowsonawall @passenger @Radical_EgoCom @RD4Anarchy
Can we not imagine situations in which people might engage in mutual aid, solidarity, and voluntary cooperation for purely selfish reasons?
@HeavenlyPossum @happycoyote12 @graphite @shadowsonawall @passenger @RD4Anarchy
I don't think that would be ideal, for people to only care for other out of selfishness instead of out of a genuine care for others.
@shadowsonawall @Radical_EgoCom @passenger @RD4Anarchy @graphite @happycoyote12
What I’m trying to say is that parsing out a person’s motivations—this percent selfishness, this percent selfless altruism—is a pointless and counterproductive exercise. It’s best to think in terms of creating systems in which people’s innate desire to self-aggrandize is best expressed through mutual aid and solidarity.
This would be the good twin two capitalism’s evil twin—a system in which our desires for prosocial cooperation and conviviality are coopted by alienating spot trades and the profit motive.
@shadowsonawall
> “Because I am a vile creature and am willing to let others suffer when doing so increases the likelihood that myself and those I care about, in an intimate personal sense, will not.”
Why is this incompatible with communism?
@passenger
@RD4Anarchy @Radical_EgoCom @happycoyote12 @graphite