• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Should Socialism - Communism be condemned like Nazim?

Should Socialism - Communism be condemned like Nazim?

  • Yes

    Votes: 14 36.8%

  • No

    Votes: 22 57.9%

  • No opinion

    Votes: 2 5.3%
  • Total voters
    38
ecofarm said:
This is nonsense. They were not spreading ideas, they were spreading propaganda. Referring to Nazi propaganda as "ideas" is a bit repulsive.
Click to expand...

Maybe this disagreement is a misunderstanding based on terminology. If you want to call dangerous ideas "propaganda" and then agree, fine, I can live with that. I was using the term "advancing ideas" as superordinate concept that includes the advancing of "propaganda". But I don't want to fight over words. If you insist propaganda and ideas are two different things, I'm fine with that.
 
Give me a minute, I edit alot.


No, propaganda is not "dangerous ideas". Propaganda is BS made up to look like reality for influence. Propaganda is to idea as fraud is to free-market... a perversion of.



Anyway, I don't see how you can be in the middle when you think racism comes from the right. Your positions on the right are few. I vote Lean left.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
If you believe that the left must be twisted to have bigots, but the right is built for them then you must lean left or be a moderate tolerating bigotry. If I believed that the left was against bigotry and the right bred it, I would be a radical leftist.
Click to expand...

No, I don't believe that.

But I believe racism is the core and a fundamental part of far-right ideology (hell, it's part of the definition of "Nazi"), so you can't really be a Nazi, i.e., without being a racist of some kind.

But racism, no matter how prevalent among socialists, is not an inherent part of their ideology. Did Marx address race? I'm no expert, but I believe Marx even said "race" and "nation" are bourgeois concepts used by the powers that be to further division among the working classes of different nations, in order to control them better. That doesn't mean, of course, that there are no racist socialists. There may be plenty.

You can say many bad things about socialism, but that racism is an inherent part of their ideology is not one of them.
 
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself.

As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda, in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus possibly lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or uses loaded messages to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the attitude toward the subject in the target audience to further a political agenda. Propaganda can be used as a form of political warfare.
Click to expand...

Whats interesting is that, given this definition (from wikipedia), everything from what the Nazi's published to Common Sense by Thomas Payne would fit.
 
ecofarm said:
Give me a minute, I edit alot.


No, propaganda is not "dangerous ideas". Propaganda is BS made up to look like reality for influence. Propaganda is to idea as fraud is to free-market... a perversion of.
Click to expand...

Fair enough. Following your definitions, I'd say you're right ideas are not the problem, but propaganda may be, under certain conditions.
 
German guy said:
You can say many bad things about socialism, but that racism is an inherent part of their ideology is not one of them.
Click to expand...

Fascism is not inherently racist, just because Nazis were. Fascism is not some kind of automatic Godwin.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
Anyway, I don't see how you can be in the middle when you think racism comes from the right. Your positions on the right are few. I vote Lean left.
Click to expand...

For the record, I want to explain my stance on racism:

I believe racism, as one variant of in-group/out-group generalization, is inherent to human nature. It's an instinctive reaction of many people to generalize and also attach negative attributes to people they perceive as "alien" (note: this is descriptive, not normative, I'm not defending this). People of all ideologies do that. Certain values and/or ideologies may try to place a counter-weight against this instinctive reaction, by promoting tolerance. But this is only successful to a limited extent.

There are ideologies that place some emphasis on battling these base instincts and ugly impulses, and there are ideologies which actively affirm this instinctive behavior. Nazism, i.e., actively affirms racist impulses among their followers. Other ideologies, such as liberalism i.e., rather emphasize equal value of human beings and rather condemn these impulses.

My impression is that socialism, while it may affirm this in-group/out-group impulse on the field of wealth ("we" the poor, "them" the rich), it does not affirm this on the field of race. Socialists rather tend towards condemning racism as an ideology that distracts from "class struggle", or not to care. Which does not mean, of course, that there are no racist socialists.
 
You are willing to equate fascism with Nazism, but you are not willing to equate socialism (or even communism) with Pot, Mao or Stalin.

I know you like the idea of moderate, as in 'moderated stances, not extreme', but you lean left. That's clear from your posts alone. This only makes it sure. I've spoken my peace on that, stick with moderate if you like it better.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
Fascism is not inherently racist, just because Nazis were. Fascism is not some kind of automatic Godwin.
Click to expand...

I didn't say anything about fascism.

When I said "far-right", I had the German example in mind (the neo-Nazi NPD, which fortunately is a fringe phenomenon). And they are racists and neo-Nazis.

If you ask me about fascism, I'd say I condemn fascism, because it's authoritarian, much like I condemn Nazism because it's authoritarian, or authoritarian brands of socialism aka communism. My point was just that not all "socialists" are authoritarian, and that many groups/movements labelled "socialist" actually are not socialist.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
You are willing to equate fascism with Nazism, but you are not willing to equate socialism with Pot, Mao or Stalin.
Click to expand...

That's because socialism is a less distinct label as "fascism" or "Nazism". There are many parties with the name "socialist" which are harmless and not authoritarian, and even more parties/movements are often labelled "socialist", although they don't even consider themselves socialist.

Do you ask me to equate Obama, i.e., or German Social Democrats, with Pot, Mao or Stalin? Some seem to ask me to do that, and that's the point where I disagree.
 
You're asking me to equate fascism, or the far-right, with Nazism. Some seem to ask me to do that, and that's the point where I disagree.

Right-wing ideology (in and of itself) does not, in any way, embrace or promote racism. Just because the Nazis did is no reason to indict the right as breeders of racism.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
You're asking me to equate fascism, or the far-right, with Nazism. Some seem to ask me to do that, and that's the point where I disagree.
Click to expand...

Hey, no need to be snippy, I believe we agree more than we disagree.

If I used sloppy language evoking the impression I equated fascism with Nazism, I apologize, that was not my intent. I believe Nazism is just one variant of fascism, and other variants are not necessarily racist. I still disagree with fascism in general, because I have a problem with their authoritarianism, much like I condemn authoritarian brands of socialism, à la Stalin, Pot or Mao.

Fair enough?
 
I'm not being snippy, I'm being smart-ass.


Anyway, you cannot indict the right because of Nazis (or TP :)

You cannot call the far-right a "cauldron of bubbling racial hatred" (I'm paraphrasing). You're demonizing based on a tragic historical psuedo-example. It's no better than hanging the slaughters of Stalin on communism.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
Right-wing ideology (in and of itself) does not, in any way, embrace or promote racism. Just because the Nazis did is no reason to indict the right as breeders of racism.
Click to expand...

See my explanation above about racism. I don't think "the right" in general breeds racism.

But I do believe that ideologies which actively affirm racist impulses are usually right-wing, as for example Nazism. But that's not true the other way, I do not believe that the right wing in general is racist.
 
But I do believe that ideologies which actively affirm racist impulses are usually right-wing, as for example Nazism. But that's not true the other way, I do not believe that the right wing in general is racist.
Click to expand...

That's better than thinking the far right creates racism; nonetheless, we find racism in every group. Labelling the right as "those who affirm racism" is demonization.

We get along fine and it's been civil, but my head is starting to hurt from reading too much. Ima put some tunes on and make fun.
 
Last edited:
ecofarm said:
I'm not being snippy, I'm being smart-ass.


Anyway, you cannot indict the right because of Nazis (or TP :)

You cannot call the far-right a "cauldron of bubbling racial hatred" (I'm paraphrasing). You're demonizing based on a tragic historical psuedo-example.
Click to expand...

The far-right? How do you define that? In my book, "far-right" (as opposed to "conservatives" or "right-wing") is defined by strong authoritarianism and strong reliance on in-group/out-group behavior. Usually, this is racist in-group/out-group thinking, but it may also be a warped nationalism taken to the extreme, or religious bigotry, or cultural chauvinism. Or all of that.

So I'd modify this: The *far*-right is indeed a "cauldron of bubbling hatred", but not necessarily racial hatred. May also be religious, nationalistic or cultural chauvinism.

Those who take national, cultural or religious pride not too far, not so far they look down on others, are not "far"-right in my book.
 
Last edited:
I don't see why the right gets nailed with all of their ideologically perverted examples but the left is spared all of theirs. It just doesn't seem fair.

Now, seriously, I'm off to check for bobos and such.
 
ecofarm said:
I don't see why the right gets nailed with all of their ideologically perverted examples but the left is spared all of theirs. It just doesn't seem fair.

Now, seriously, I'm off to check for bobos and such.
Click to expand...

I believe it would be nice if neither the moderate right was conflated with Nazism or the like, nor the moderate left with the likes of Stalin, Pot or Mao. The latter was what Alfons attempted to do by starting this thread.

See you next time and thanks for the debate!
 
ecofarm said:
I don't see why the right gets nailed with all of their ideologically perverted examples but the left is spared all of theirs. It just doesn't seem fair.

Now, seriously, I'm off to check for bobos and such.
Click to expand...

Each side has their own failings, but those failings are different.
 
I can entertain a notion without believing it.

"Let communism continue and disregard the collateral."
 
Alfons said:
Can you imagine yourselves that everybody may wear swastika, laugh about Auschwitz, say "Hail Hitler" and broadcast "Main Kampf" as a positive teaching?
It is impossible and difficult to believe.

Can you imagine Hitler as avatar here?

Socialism - Communism has killed at least five times more as Nazism, but no one communist is punished, the devil's red star continue to be on the Kremlin top, the mummy of Lenin is open to show, socialists are allow to spread their lies without any prohibition in all western countries, moreover some medias air the programs about Lenin, Marx, Mao as a very nice guys, who were only "misunderstand".

It is something wrong here, maybe should begin to condemn Socialism - Communism like Nazism, right?
Click to expand...

The Mayor DOES condemn socialism, in all it's forms, National Socialism, Fascism, Communism, Liberalism, and socialism.

The dead bodies are the symptom, the socialism is the disease.
 
Mayor Snorkum said:
The Mayor DOES condemn socialism, in all it's forms, National Socialism, Fascism, Communism, Liberalism, and socialism.

The dead bodies are the symptom, the socialism is the disease.
Click to expand...

Looks like you are in good company with Alfons. :lol:
 
ecofarm said:
You're asking me to equate fascism, or the far-right, with Nazism. Some seem to ask me to do that, and that's the point where I disagree.

Right-wing ideology (in and of itself) does not, in any way, embrace or promote racism. Just because the Nazis did is no reason to indict the right as breeders of racism.
Click to expand...


Umm....Nazism was a variant of fascism... its even considered "rightist" on the old one-dimensional political alignment diagram. Communism is far left.

Communism killed far more people than fascism, therefore being on the left is deadlier than being on the right.


The Constitution is the Center.

One doesnt need to go to extremes. True libertarianism is as far as one can go to the right, beyond that point the idiots are talking about using government force to compell or constrain behavior, and if one doesn't listen to the details but only the requests that government DO something it's not supposed to, the far right is as odious as the Obama Butt Kissing Left.
 
Mayor Snorkum said:
The Mayor DOES condemn socialism, in all it's forms, National Socialism, Fascism, Communism, Liberalism, and socialism.

The dead bodies are the symptom, the socialism is the disease.
Click to expand...

The Socialism deserve to be condemned because it is most deadly utopie in the world.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom