Communism - Good or evil?

[Darth Tiberius]

I really think that communism is a terribly wrong sort of thing to have in this world. I Quillinoi they have had a OOC debate about this and I think that even liing communism is ridiculous. I'll save time since I don't have much to leave people to say if they think communism is good and why. I'd like to hear a intelligent answer please!! After I get a few replies I'll go into a much deeper explaination why communism is stupid. Especially Marx and Lennin.

[new.vogue.nightmare]

Communism in theory was supposed to solve all sorts of problems. But Marx forgot one thing when he formulated his ideology - People have to live under it. And people normally don't work well together unless there's some sort of reward right in front of them. Or some sort of punishment waiting behind them.

[ephiroll]

It wasn't really that Marx's ideas were so wrong, it's just that the wrong people took interest in them. Marx envisioned his plan to work in some of the more developed countries of the world such as England, France, and the United States. Instead the opposite happened and the most backward of the world powers twisted his ideas into something that would give them absolute power and by the time they were finished very few people realize that Marx wasn't a communist. Stalin, Lenin, and Mao where communists, Communism is a evil twisted version of Marxism and should not be confused with it.

[rklenseth]

Lenin created Communism.
Carl Marx created Marxism.
Thought I would point that out since they are very different ideals in some respects.

Communism is neighter good or evil. It's a good idea but the problem with it is that is makes it to easy for assholes like Stalin to take total power. Communism strips away everything from a population so that for a while the people have to rely on the state in order to survive until a proper commune system that can live on itself is set up. The problem is that Stalin came and took over before this could be realized so as long as the Soviet Government kept everything away from the people (like a featherless bird that has to rely on the master or die, so said Stalin himself) and pretty much said to them if you don't cooperate you will die. Plus these people couldn't really rebel. They would have no clothes, no food, no water and definitely no weaponry. Plus then these people have to worry about their children. They would suffer the most if they tried to rebel. By the time Stalin came to power, everything was in the proper place for him to do this. Lenin had hoped after about 30 years the Soviet Government would become obsolete and non-existent and the commune system up. That didn't happen.

And Jerry is right. Marx's idea was for the working class to overthrow the wealthy and middle class people because of the horrors of the Industrial Revolution. Russia didn't hit an Industrial Revolution until after it had gone over to Communism which is far different from Marxism.

To point out another fact; Communist ideals come from Marxims and Facist ideals come from Utopian Socialism.

I'm also Moderate Conservative so I wouldn't support communistic or facistic ideals UNLESS there was no other way for example welfare but only for those that really need for there are a lot that don't and should get their lazy asses up and get a job.

[JherodJ]

My interpretation of communism is the greatest ideal for government I believe the world has ever accomplished,However its perfect on paper and catastrophic in practice,I think the reason can be linked to what ephiroll said,and the fact what I consider communism(im the one who engaged in an ooc debate,but i didnt start it) to be all about perfect calculations in a perfect world,unfortantly we live in reality,where nothing can be exactly quantified(see different examples of quantum and string theory)Basically the unpredictable,or what is now called Chaos theory(but can sometimes be somewhat predicted in the long term)
But in cantr I believe it has a much better chance,Do to the absolute predictabilty of the enviroment.Such as trip distance,time to gather resources etc.
There are some things that cant be predicted like if people up and die,but
theres usually a rapid influx of characters,unfortantly in cantr as well as in life.nations might have to be forced into it for a century to see how good it can really be,of course what I call communism isnt the same as you interpret it,My idea of what communism is.I doubt has ever been realized.
well maybe buhdist monks.I believe if Man wasn`t greedy and didnt always want more this is how life would be or if we concerned ourselves primarily with the spiritual world and saw the ethics in all of our actions.again this is how it would be.
But,Man obviously isn`t meant for perfection,for not growing is death to our minds,and perfection is only arrestment.The question is can a place in Cantr be different? To give us a chance to expierence absolute harmony purpose and dare I say it again perfection.

[rklenseth]

The problem with Communism and Facism is that the world is not perfect. By the way, neither of those are governmental structures but political ideals. Communism was developed by Lenin stemming off from Marxism but became completely different in many respects. I'm not sure who they give credit to for the development of Facism whether it be Hitler or Mussolini. Since Hitler's Facist group became more powerful and quicker than that of Mussolini's then I would presume they would give him credit for it. I'm not sure though.

[JherodJ]

your gorgetting a player in the game RK plato and socrates first toyed with the ideas of socialism,which gave rise to marx and ingels,which gave rise to lenin,etc I think the biggest prob with this development line is the 3rd age was obviously ran by evil men(politicians) as opposed to philosiphers.

and i didnt give an answer in my post communism as an ideal-perfection
communism in practive-one of the worst atrocities to mankind.

[JherodJ]

I have to counter again,Fascism hates socialism,facsism is the answer to what communism was suppose to become,as you mentioned.Facism is about the wealthy elite once and for all putting the poor in there place,What happened? communisms became facisms do to the fact the world runs on money and russia was not a major player outside influences allowed the facsist takeover of russia and called it communism.Much like there have been Facist takeovers of most of the world.Benign and as unnoticeable as they be,money rules all proves facsist are in power.
Utopian socialism is more akin to the idea of the commune system desired by Lenin. And truly is the ultimate evolution of a wealthy society,effectively eliminating have-nots.With respect and Love for all beings.

utopian socialism gives birth to what communism should be,roman emperialism,is the iinspiration of Facsism.

[JherodJ]

The sad thing is the Fascist took control of the idea of what I call communism(Hitler and Stalin were no different)
and gave birth to the communist systems in existence today.(probally to stop world interest in the subject,there could be a way without gold)
But really since the world always ran on money and most will sell there mom for a price Does a utopia have a chance? Not in any forseable future on earth.

oh and the two-party system is the easiest way to place a Facsist government in control of a people who think there free.
it`s easiest to let them think they`re free.It cost less to maintain and more interest can be charged.Plus it`s much less bloody than totalatarinism
which is what Stalins government was accurately described as.

I consider myself a citizen of The U.F.S.A ever since FDRdeclared a state of national emergency,which no president has ever lifted.

[west]

The thing that turns any ideal into pale reality is the fact that the world is populated by human beings

basically

and there's no such thing as an altruistic human being...IRL, anyway

If humans weren't human, communism would be great...

but to be human is to be selfish...there's no way around it...

therefore, there will always be those few humans who are openly and extremely selfish who try to seize power/money/influence for themselves....and that's when ideals corrupt.

[rklenseth]

The Nazi party started out as a Conservative working class party. The Conservative Elite hated them as well as the ideals of facism. Facism was very socialistic in the Utopian manner which in the Reformation Age was more religious (Puritans, Calvinists; creating the perfect society). Facism is also akin to Darwinist (I'm not sure if I spelled that right) Socialism.

Remember there was more than just one type of socialism and it can both ways as far as political idealogy.

By the way it would be very hard for any facist government to take control of the US government. The US government isn't the Weimer Republic which has many faults and made it too easy for one group of people to come to power. Plus, other people made mistakes. The original creators of the Nazi party was using Hitler to further their ideals but it turned out in the end Hitler was using them just as Napoleon used the people who placed him in power of the French Republic. Plus, many Conservatives made the mistake of trying to align with the facists in the hope to silence the communists and other Liberal socialistic parties in Germany who were trying to take power after the end of World War I. The only reason why this didn't happen was that a lot of German soldiers returning from the war became to hate the communists and fought back. Plus, many of these same soldiers joined the ranks of the Nazi party bolstering its power. The Conservatives thought that the communists and others were a graver threat than the Nazi party and facists at the time. They thought they could control and use the Nazis for their own gain but they underestimated them but mostly of all underestimated Hitler.

The US government has too many checks and balances and levels of government for one person or group of people to take over politically. Most people in America are Moderate so they could vote either way and that's why we have politicians from all over the political arena but most of them fall under moderate in order to please the the majority of Americans. The US is in fact three different and separate governments, local, state, and federal. Each has there own responsibilities that the others cannot intrude upon. And each level of government consists of three branches with their own powers and checks the other branch so that one could never have too much power. I could see a the US being taken over by force but that is likely not going to happen because as I said, most Americans are moderate, which is far from reactionary or radical. But times could change but I don't see it in the near future.

Lenin was a Marxist before he discovered Communism. Marxists believe in a slow pace for the working class to overthrow the other classes (an evolutionary ladder) and that is where Lenin disagreed. He thought that it should be more radical and violent and that is where the first difference lies with the two ideals.

Utopian Socialism is about bringing out the perfect society where everyone knows what they have to do and does it for the good of the society. Communism does take some ideals from that the Utopian ideal but Facism takes more of it. You are right that the facists hated socialism but of the Liberal type. The facists believed in bringing out the best society; the German peoples united under one government, a race of perfect human beings (impossible), Italy being brought back to its days of glory as the Roman Empire. This could all be achieved by the people being brought together in a socialistic manner so as to benefit the 'perfect' society best in which the facists were trying to create.

Socialism is very hard to understand, especially since it lies in both ends of the political spectrum. I once thought that socialism only existed on the Liberal side of the spectrum until someone opened my eyes up and I saw that my perception was totally wrong. Personally, I don't believe any of these types of socialisms will ever work. I've read The Prince and I understand from that how the Human Race works and I know because of the nature of man that such things would never be possible.

[rklenseth]

The thing that turns any ideal into pale reality is the fact that the world is populated by human beings

basically

and there's no such thing as an altruistic human being...IRL, anyway

If humans weren't human, communism would be great...

but to be human is to be selfish...there's no way around it...

therefore, there will always be those few humans who are openly and extremely selfish who try to seize power/money/influence for themselves....and that's when ideals corrupt.

Ah, I see you read The Prince. If you haven't, you would probably totally agree with what Machiavelli said about the Human Race. I do believe though that there are 'some' good people out there. It's just that most people outnumber those few.

[west]

THose few have found something more important than themselves in their lives...

[rklenseth]

I have a professor that says that all of saints are dead and gone. I think he maybe right.

[JherodJ]

RK do you really believe all that crap you said about the U.S government?
It`s like your quoting the constituion,hate to tell you most of it has been bypassed or circumvented(first amendment isn`t valid as anyone getting arrested for disorderly conduct can tell you,the second well,that is eaten more every day,fourth has been obsolete since the war on drugs,the fifth is under constant assault,and habeas corpus has beenrendered expensible,do to the war on terrorism.),It`s a two party system for christ sakes,I think between 300 million americans we could come up with more than 2 ideas of how to run government.It`s obviously just the minimum needed illusion to keep us under control(americans arnt to bright) I don`t know what your talking about Facsism as a workers party,yes many low class joined(many more were brainwashed) but the party itself was financed by the richest germans of the era(Partly because they didn`t want to share the repreraion taxes of WW1)Just as Trosky was released from america or europe(cant remember exactly) and sent to the first soviet council,funded by american and european bankers.If you look at history you can see clearly it`s a puppet,someone somewhere for some purpose is pulling strings.And as long as we have our playthings who really cares,right?

Seriously your intelligent RK but your either Naieve or Im crazy,or maybe us both,or maybe all of us.
Good politicing;)