RE: Fascism of the Left: Dinesh DSouza Breaks Down The Fun and Obvious Reality
Communism as practised in the SU was state capitalism. This is far from a “funny move,” it is a historical, established fact. Communism as theorised by Plato, Marx, Fourier and others can't be conceptualised as state-centric because it is anti-state. Again, the state is a historical social relation. The state is the product of social relations and consolidating those social relations. Communism is the withdrawal of the state and the instalment of the dictatorship of the proletariat. By socialism I refer to the Utopianists of the 19th century. You are confusing the state with capitalism in your assertion of giving up rights. Under capitalism there is no choice, because everything (emotions, nature, everything) is appropriate by surplus value. Under perfect capitalism, there is no outside. It cannibalises everything. Every emotion, is robbed and stripped from its essence and become another fetish of capital. The rest of your text is pure rhetoric and empty of argument. Fascism is corporatism, in which the state manages and regulates the drawbacks of a nationalised capitalist economy against the Other. The Other suffers time and again. Fascism is the ultimate and inevitable outcome of liberal economics. Once again, It is properous that the left reads the right, but the right does not read the left.
Hahaha, so to use the "left's" terminology against you. You are trying to appropriate anarchism and apply it to communism. You did mention dictatorship, which requires people organize into government, which means there is a "state" present. Argument destroyed.
People's Republic of China - Dictatorship of the People - Communism
People's Republic of Korea - Dictatorship of the People - Communism
Untold millions of dead at the hands of the "proliteriate"
So what happens to every single communist "revolution"? Huh? They ALL fail and end up being "state capitalism"? Come on. The end is the same, no matter which path you take the populace on. Free Market Capitalism is just the free movement of money, without state control, period. That's it. It is an economic system. You're rhetoric trying to associate capitalism with cannibalizing everything and marketing it is hilarious. Look, you don't want to pay your bills, you don't like that things in life cost money, you think if you and a bunch of other ner do wells "proliteriate" group up you can "dictate" how society should operate, to your benefit. What greed.
Why don't we look at the fruits of each system, free market capitalism has produced more wealth for every strata of social class than any other system to date, communism in the way it represents itself is the opposite, mass poverty, loss of basic human rights, mass murder. Explain the failures of communism. I'm reading you very well, you are promoting a populist ideology which attracts the "lottery ticket" mentality in people. The idea that you could have it all for free. Love what you've done in Venezuela.
I think you misunderstand what dictatorship of the proletariat refers to. Please read on this, because it does not mean what you think it does. For the conceptual difference between communism and anarchism, please read the discussions between Marx and Bakunin.
China is by no stretch of the imagination communist. Just because I say an apple is a banana, does not make the banana an apple. Read Wang Hui, Breslin and others on the political economy of China. For the “People's Republic of Korea - Dictatorship of the People”, please read on the concept of Juche. The DPRK is not communist, but for different reasons than the Chinese case. Again, communism is not possible within a state, a state is a social relation (third time I tried to explain this).
“Free Market Capitalism is just the free movement of money, without state control, period. That's it” Please stop the rethorical phrasing, Trump does this a lot. Just because you reiterate, things don’t get more factual. You need theorisation, conceptualisation etc. There have been several instances in history in which we have seen communism or anarcho forms of communism. They have all been targeted against or taken place outside of the state. They include 1930s Barcelona, 1890s Ukraine, contemporary Northern Iraq (under the Kurds) , but one can also think of the Greek polis as having been a direct democracy. There are numerous examples, but that requires again reading. Please do not give up, please do read. Ask people that did their PhDs on the subject, ask academics, visit lectures in universities nearby (they are often free to easy to enter and attend). Where are you based? Perhaps I can direct you?
Edit: "proliteriate"? proletariat, please And again, please use this concept wisely, it does not refer to a national "people" (as you seem to think it does)
Edit 2: "Why don't we look at the fruits of each system, free market capitalism has produced more wealth for every strata of social class than any other system to date" - I think even mainstream liberal economists would disagree with this somewhat dated 1990s thesis... https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/28/thomas-piketty-capital-surprise-bestseller
Dude, you keep trying to say that communism is not a state. That is patently false and virtually retarded. It requires a centralized governing body to implement any of it's ideologies. In order to implement universal housing, healthcare, transit, education and on and on, you would be required to have a dictatorial force to impose this. Again it is a government, which purports to be run by the general will of the population, which is impossible because people differ so much in values/opinion. You can argue that the current American system is fledgling and I would agree, but is not operating in a free market capacity. Government is in control of the economy and government is bought and paid for by banks, which support and fund communist revolutionaries. Those precious universities that you uphold, are state run, and they promote what suits the state best. Communism (as taught by the university to you) is nothing but a means to corporate state control, "state capitalism" as you would call it.
Explain how communism works without a government, none, zero, zilch, nada. Explain it. No person or group in control of anything. Implementation of this pipe dream of a theory requires government, a state.
I suppose you mean a global, universal government that doesn't resist itself to nationalities, borders, regions... that is still a state, government, political body. Whatever vocabulary you want to put on it, it is the same meaning.
No, communism is not a state. It is utopian, it never has been "a state." The sovereign Westphalian state dates back to the 17th century and is a historically, mostly Western governmental invention. It has nothing to do with communism, absolutely zero. It is in fact antithetical to the state. Communism does not need a “centralized governing body” (who ever said that?) but is an expression of direct democracy. That is why the ancient polis is often been used an example of how communism would look like. “In order to implement universal housing, healthcare, transit, education and on and on, you would [NOT] be required to have a dictatorial force to impose this.” Just look at the number of example I gave you. If you are interested to learn, although it seems that you are not, why don’t you have a look at the history of Barcelona, the Paris Communes etc.? What is the reason you don’t want to study? You do not seem to understand that communism does not work and is not compatible with capitalism. They are two different political-economic systems. The state is the product and facilitator of capitalism. The British Empire and Western colonialism more generally thrived on the basis of state-led capitalist colonialism. They exported, facilitated and implemented the Westphalian state system around the world.
“Explain how communism works without a government, none, zero, zilch, nada. Explain it.” From each according to his ability, to each according to his need (or needs), that is the basic principle and it has been done and continues to be done around the world. I have given you many different examples around the world, but you can even look in your American backyard. The occupy movement was/ is (?) a clear example of direct democracy without a state. It was dissolved (?) not because of internal tension, but because of the capitalist state with its monopoly on violence. Why it has this monopoly? To protect private property. Yes, again an attribute/ key cornerstone of capitalism.
You seem to think that governance is always equal and has always been equal to the state, but you seem to forget that there was no state before its modern invention. Its poor historisation. Please do some serious reading. There is lots of material out there, it would be a shame to put all of it to waste. Plato>Kant>Hegel>Marx>Nietzsche>Foucault = is the least difficult way towards emancipation. You owe it (only to) yourself.
Okay, I see what you mean. So you're talking about maybe the "true" form of communism which is peer to peer rather than through a governing body. If that is the case, the conversation turns to individual moral principles. And communism in your view is an adoption of individual principles that people should choose to adopt, not necessarily be forced to adopt. That I can respect. Although, in practice as organized, under the "guise" of communism it has been done by force, and with extreme failure. Even by forcing the public to be "charitable" the system fails. From a peer to peer method, I would assume it to fail as well because from a societal standpoint, people are not universally charitable.
Theoretically I would say what you want is charity, I would argue that under "free market capitalism" there is a greater degree of charity than under any other system. US is probably the most charitable country globally (as far as peer to peer transactions go), it may fall into the category more cleanly than the system you are trying to adopt. You might consider capitalism as a more realized utopia.