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Does communism force a portion of the population to live in poverty?

Does communism cause most of the population to live in poverty?


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The Petrograd Soviet was a democratically elected council, they gave the power to the higher members to topple the provisional government, after which the power continued to be concentrated in the hands of the authorities.

The authorities by definition are those in whom power is concentrated. Be clear.

Point still stands, it took an act of force to create the government.

It takes an act of force to overthrow any state and to maintain the conditions of rule of any state. The American Revolution was an act of force to overthrow the British colonial state and impose a new domestic rule on the colonies.
 
The authorities by definition are those in whom power is concentrated. Be clear.

Yes but it did not fulfill the basic ideological tenant it was supposed to, democratic control.


It takes an act of force to overthrow any state and to maintain the conditions of rule of any state. The American Revolution was an act of force to overthrow the British colonial state and impose a new domestic rule on the colonies.

As such the new state was designed to not be an autocracy and further that it was to be pluralistic.
So that those who lived there, could chose their style of governance.
 
Yes but it did not fulfill the basic ideological tenant it was supposed to, democratic control.

It certainly did, for a time. Although I'm not sure what point your attempting to make here, as if you're attempting to use the Petrograd Soviet as an example of your silly little assertion above, I've already refuted that nonsense.

As such the new state was designed to not be an autocracy and further that it was to be pluralistic.
So that those who lived there, could chose their style of governance.

And? I could just quote your own post here to "refute" yourself!

You said:
In order for a[n independent America] to exist, it must be done with force.
A great many people will resist it, with violence.
A centralized authority must be established to wrestle that control.
Of course, they won't return it to the people.

The funny thing here is that the American state was never intended to represent the interests of the people as a whole.
 
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It certainly did, for a time.

It truly is unfortunate that it didn't continue, I mean that sincerely.


And? I could just quote your own post here to "refute" yourself!

You could if the intent was to establish one type of society.
That my problem with national communism, a great deal of force must be used to make everyone participate in that style of government.

What I want is for people to chose locally what they want, whether it be communism or totally unregulated capitalism.

The funny thing here is that the American state was never intended to represent the interests of the people as a whole.

In the national sense, you're absolutely right and I agree with it.
The national government shouldn't be uniformly deciding for a diverse people.
 
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Harry Guerrilla said:
You could if the intent was to establish one type of society.
That my problem with national communism, a great deal of force must be used to make everyone participate in that style of government.

What are you even talking about here? You're really jumping all over the place with your posts to the point where I don't even know what your point is that you're attempting to make or how any of this is supposed to support them.

What I want is for people to chose locally what they want, whether it be communism or totally unregulated capitalism.

Of course, and if that was possible then we could all ride our unicorns to work where our jobs would be to play Xbox and eat cheeseburgers all day while still looking like gods/goddesses.

Unfortunately, that's not how the real world works. History on such a scale isn't created out of rational choice or personal preference.
 
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What are you even talking about here? You're really jumping all over the place with your posts to the point where I don't even know what your point is that you're attempting to make or how any of this is supposed to support them.

You said I have to make people comply by force, which is only true in the sense that I want people to be able to learn to choose for themselves.

With the example of the Petrograd Soviet and the establishment of national communism, my choice and the choices of others are decided for me.
Not agreeable.


Of course, and if that was possible then we could all ride our unicorns to work where our jobs would be to play Xbox and eat cheeseburgers all day while still looking like gods/goddesses.

Unfortunately, that's not how the real world works.

Do I really need to pull up examples of successful communes and less regulated capitalist groups, in the U.S. to show how pluralism can work?
 
Erm, Russia has a **** ton of people in real poverty.
Nothing compared to here.
If that is how they are "keeping up", they can keep "winning."

China owns most of our debt because we borrowed money from them.
China has abandoned the communist economic model because they realize, that it is a failure.
Are you trying to say that the US has no poverty. There is plenty of failure to go around. Your homeless shelters and welfare roles are overflowing. Stop with the were so good and Russia is so bad.
 
I want to be clear.
Do you need me to name of communist country where the leaders vacuum the wealth of the nation from the masses who are poor?
Yes because you will not be able to. So I am trying to figure out where all these Communist demons are that you speak of.
 
Are you trying to say that the US has no poverty. There is plenty of failure to go around. Your homeless shelters and welfare roles are overflowing. Stop with the were so good and Russia is so bad.

The amount of homeless people in the U.S. is negligible, many of them are homeless by choice.

Welfare, ha, I know people on welfare with multiple cars, multiple advanced television sets and disposable income.
Not even close to not being able to feed oneself.
 
The amount of homeless people in the U.S. is negligible, many of them are homeless by choice.

Many homeless have mental problems, and no one is willing to take care of them. Most of the time it's not by choice Harry. Gotta disagree with you there.

United States: According to HUD's July 2008 3rd Homeless Assessment Report to Congress, in a single night in January 2007, single point analysis reported to HUD showed there were 671,888 sheltered and unsheltered homeless persons nationwide in the United States. Also, HUD reported the number of chronically homeless people (those with repeated episodes or who have been homeless for long periods, 2007 data) as 123,833. 82% of the homeless are not chronically homeless, and 18% are (6% Chronically Homeless Sheltered, 12% Chronically Homeless Unsheltered). Their Estimate of Sheltered Homeless Persons during a One-Year Period, October 2006 to September 2007, that about 1,589,000 persons used an emergency shelter and/or transitional housing during the 12-month period, which is about 1 in every 200 persons in the United States was in a homeless facility in that time period. Individuals accounted for 1,115,054 or 70.2% and families numbered 473,541 or 29.8%. The number of persons in sheltered households with Children was about 130,968.
 
Many homeless have mental problems, and no one is willing to take care of them. Most of the time it's not by choice Harry. Gotta disagree with you there.

I do understand that end of it but the other solution is institutionalization, which is much worse than homelessness.

That is why we ended it.
 
katiegrrl0 said:
Are you trying to say that the US has no poverty. There is plenty of failure to go around. Your homeless shelters and welfare roles are overflowing. Stop with the were so good and Russia is so bad.

You're using anecdotal "evidence", which fails. The simple truth lies in per-capita GDP and national mean wages. If you compare Americans below the poverty line and Europeans below the poverty line, it's not even close.

Almost half of all Americans below the poverty line own outright the houses they live in. 97% own color televisions. Two-thirds have cable. Hell, even one-third have cell phones.

Kinda makes all those people in the bread lines look pretty frickin' stupid, huh...
 
You said I have to make people comply by force

I never said that.

I said that all states must use force or the threat of force in order to maintain the conditions of their rule. All states are by their very nature authoritarian.

which is only true in the sense that I want people to be able to learn to choose for themselves.

And I already responded to this. Socio-economic systems are not something brought about through rational decision or personal preference, but rather through the development of history. Your belief that people should be able to "choose" capitalism or communism is a fantasy that will never have any basis in reality because it is contrary to how the real world works.

You could go around believing that people should be able to choose whether or not they can breathe underwater and it will have no relevance to anything because it's a completely unrealistic and nonsensical belief.

Do I really need to pull up examples of successful communes and less regulated capitalist groups, in the U.S. to show how pluralism can work?

Examples of "communes and less regulated capitalist groups" are irrelevant because we are talking about socio-economic systems on a world scale, not partially isolated communes which are really small groups of people that generally operate within the laws of the system which their commune is supposed to be outside of.

Isolated and small instances like this are irrelevant, regardless of whether we're referring to capitalist or non-capitalist communes.
 
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Yes but it did not fulfill the basic ideological tenant it was supposed to, democratic control.

This is false, the bolsheviks never really followed a liberal democratic model, liberal democratic communist upheaval was suppressed by them.
 
I do understand that end of it but the other solution is institutionalization, which is much worse than homelessness.

That is why we ended it.

What? You cant make proper institutions to treat homelessness? thats some low goalkeeping there.
 
On paper, no...

In practice, that's how it worked out.
 
The funny thing here is that the American state was never intended to represent the interests of the people as a whole.


I just want to say, that during our nations history we have only represented the will of the people as a whole for a few decades now, and we have a completely polarized dual party system responsible most likely for all the vitriolic nastiness consuming our nation to this day. What we have in modern america is an experiment of democracy which is unprecedented and unstable. Given this in context, the most polarised government and people we have ever seen, can we seriously put the governments of other nations down for being conservative in their regards to democratic freedoms? When russia seems to crack down on leftist groups or when Chavez shuts down opposition tv stations for supporting foreign coups against him? (Im not for these things of course :D but they happen and are of real world considerations that do not easily translate into american domestic politics)
 
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On paper, no...

In practice, that's how it worked out.

the supression of 'democratic' communist movements in russia during revolutionary times?
Thats what hey teach us in college anyways. I never really liked some of the writers of russian history presented to us in english curriculum.
 
SE102 said:
I just want to say, that during our nations history we have only represented the will of the people as a whole for a few decades now

I disagree with this. I don't think the American state has ever represented the interests of "the people as a whole" and it never will. There is no such thing as "the will of the people as a whole," anyways.
 
You're using anecdotal "evidence", which fails. The simple truth lies in per-capita GDP and national mean wages. If you compare Americans below the poverty line and Europeans below the poverty line, it's not even close.

Almost half of all Americans below the poverty line own outright the houses they live in. 97% own color televisions. Two-thirds have cable. Hell, even one-third have cell phones.

Kinda makes all those people in the bread lines look pretty frickin' stupid, huh...
Actually no it makes those that are in poverty watching colour TV seem pretty stupid. Maybe if they got off their dead lazy capitalist asses they may be able to get a job. It makes Americans seem pretty stupid on a whole if they really think the ownership of a colour TV as important. Where do you see bread lines. Is that what the economy in America has brought to your neighborhood. Maybe I can do a collection in St Petersburg and send you some money to feed those poor dumb bastards. Maybe they can get snacks when they watch TV. There are no bread lines here. There may have been in the past. But that is corrected. Maybe you would like to study up on Russia and see what life is like. I know you are talking about Russia as you actually think it is Communist.
 
I never said that.

I said that all states must use force or the threat of force in order to maintain the conditions of their rule. All states are by their very nature authoritarian.

Yes so in order for any communist rule to take place, if would have to put some of the working class to the sword.

And I already responded to this. Socio-economic systems are not something brought about through rational decision or personal preference, but rather through the development of history. Your belief that people should be able to "choose" capitalism or communism is a fantasy that will never have any basis in reality because it is contrary to how the real world works.

You could go around believing that people should be able to choose whether or not they can breathe underwater and it will have no relevance to anything because it's a completely unrealistic and nonsensical belief.

Breathing underwater ≠ economic pluralism.
That should be apparent as one is currently impossible, while the other has already existed.

Examples of "communes and less regulated capitalist groups" are irrelevant because we are talking about socio-economic systems on a world scale, not partially isolated communes which are really small groups of people that generally operate within the laws of the system which their commune is supposed to be outside of.

Isolated and small instances like this are irrelevant, regardless of whether we're referring to capitalist or non-capitalist communes.

But they aren't irrelevant, the many 50 states have varying degrees of regulation.
Some with very little, others with a lot.
So we know at least part of it is true.

Communes quite frequently operate outside the laws of the nation they were created in.
Labor laws and minimum wage regulations are not always followed by the communes.
 
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This is false, the bolsheviks never really followed a liberal democratic model, liberal democratic communist upheaval was suppressed by them.

The Petrograd Soviet was a democratically elected political group, that essentially captured the Soviet Republic, from the other political parties.

What? You cant make proper institutions to treat homelessness? thats some low goalkeeping there.

Treating mental illness is incredibly difficult.
These people tend to phase in and out of stability, even with counseling and medication.
There are many free avenues available for people with mental disorders, halfway homes and career counseling but you can't make them do it.

The other less than nice option, is to institutionalize them.
You should read about that.
 
katiegrrl0 said:
Maybe you would like to study up on Russia and see what life is like.

I already know about modern-day Russia. More billionaires than America. This is partially why I laugh about your cheap shots at wealth disparity since you seem to be defending a country with a worse one than America by leaps and bounds.

Relax, sweetheart. The days of the Stasi are over. You can talk about the hammer and sickle without fear of your cousin sending you to the gulag.

I know you are talking about Russia as you actually think it is Communist.

If you had read my first post, which you clearly haven't, you would see me say that communism has never existed in its most pure form. Soviet Russia operated by command-style totalitarianism, as communism is essentially about a half step from anarchy because communism has no hierarchy of rule. The old Soviet Union was probably the closest thing you could get to a textbook definition of socialism. Socialism is, in and of itself, hyper-authoritarian where people are prevented from accumulating wealth outside the collective. It's a marathon of status quo that ultimately prevents expansion and growth.

This is also why you lost the Cold War.

Game over - insert quarter and play again. This is pretty damn fun.
 
If you had read my first post, which you clearly haven't, you would see me say that communism has never existed in its most pure form. Soviet Russia operated by command-style totalitarianism, as communism is essentially about a half step from anarchy because communism has no hierarchy of rule. The old Soviet Union was probably the closest thing you could get to a textbook definition of socialism.

There is no 'textbook' definition of socialism, because the term is used to describe many models of government, economics, and political theory--utopian vs. scientific.
State-Directed or Decentralized economy. Market socialism, Libertarian socialism, social anarchism. Social democracy, democratic socialism...

The problem with far-right pundits with their anti-Obama talking points is that they give their audience an a limited and false definition to foster fear and ignorance about socialism. Glenn Beck says he learned about the evils of progressives and socialists by reading books at the public library. Go figure.

Socialism is, in and of itself, hyper-authoritarian where people are prevented from accumulating wealth outside the collective. It's a marathon of status quo that ultimately prevents expansion and growth.

Um... China?

Vietnam, high-tech industry and third-largest oil producer in Southeast Asia.

Of course, both have added free market elements as part of their planned economy.

The point is, Gipper, it all depends on what brand of socialism you're talking about.
 
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