RE: Seeking Knowledge And The Ability To Understand And Interpret It... "Marxism"
I got a busy yesterday and couldn't reply. Interactions like this are my reason for doing these posts, so don't take what i'm going to say as anything more than what it is - receiving and conveying information for a greater purpose... I sort of have to approach your comments like this - every point you make is no more or less what one would expect from someone who really has no clue what they are talking about - all of your assertions (to use your words) are the same "tired old excuse" used by right wing apologists to bolster (or hide) their own misguided notions of what is and what should be. The assertion that Marxism as proposed by Marx is fundamentally the same as Communism, Maoism, etc. -relating the atrocities committed by them as somehow directly related to Marx, only displays a total lack of understanding of the different systems of governance and their effects on a population. You specifically appear to be equating my use and description of "right wing philosophy" in failed political systems, as an affront to you personally - and in predictable fashion, in the absence of supporting evidence for your claims, you make it personal. In the end it's just like I said yesterday - All thats left is a missing (i)... ;)
Marxist systems applied by today's governments include:
Universal healthcare, free education, public libraries, police and fire departments, public roads and highways, food stamps and social security... Etc. etc. etc. Although these systems are not exactly as envisioned by Marx, they have proven to work in modern societies.
"Successful" Marxist systems applied in the world today include:
Most of Europe in one way or another, Cuba - despite its problems, arguably directly caused by US "interference", countless Communal societies throughout Central and South America - I have visited several in Bolivia, Peru, and Panama / interesting variations on the theory - its amazing what can be accomplished when there is no "authority" dictating practices. Decades of research yet needed to determine overall success... Now your turn... :)
Universal healthcare, free education, food stamps and social security... are certainly marxist ideals and in my country Universal healthcare was applied by socialists (CCF for healthcare) the Soviet Union also had all of these things even if they didn't apply them as Marx envisioned.
Public roads and highways, when the automobile companies bought all the electric trolley companies and closed them. Afterward lobbying for roadbuilding so they could sell more cars was that marxism?
Andrew Carnegie built a lot of public libraries was he a marxist?
Here you made a good point about some of the ideals of marxism having merit, something which I never denied, will you now admit that some of the ideals of marxism have had disastrous consequences when applied in the real world? Like a planned economy.
Has a dictatorship of the proletariat worked? Or have workers turned out to be not very effective managers and time after time ceded power to political thugs of the worst kind.
Sweden (as an example)has many socialist tendencies but they were able to afford not because of a successful planned economy governed by worker councils but because of being running dog war profiteers during the second world war and there are some who feel that Sweden's socialist tendencies are having a very poor result.
Did US interference cause Castro to amass such enormous wealth?
Communal societies are a part of Christian ideology although these systems are not exactly as envisioned by Christ, they have proven to work in modern societies.
I'm not informed about these places you visited but I would like to be, I'm always interesting in learning about people figuring things out for themselves.
I would even be willing to go one step further and propose that all the good things you credit Marx with inventing were actually innovations of jewish thought that were later perverted by left-wing marxist authoritarianism!
No that was capitalism...
That was capitalism and philanthropy.
Not knowing what country you are referring to in this example makes it impossible to answer with any accuracy so I will counter with a question - isn't it likely, even probable that upon seeing weakness within a society, power is taken and not "ceded"...
A claim like that should be accompanied by evidence to support it.
There are so many things wrong with that statement, I don't know where to start. First off, Marx's theories were not inventions, they were/are systems of governance - perhaps Jewish tradition was an influence, but something tells me it wasn't.
Leftist literally means / to quote myself:
BUSTER... :)
Your point about ceding vs taken is a good one, the very weakness of utopian fantasies like marxism is one of their biggest faults. While leftist look at themselves as advocates of or adherents to egalitarianism - and think that the more left wing an ideology is, the more it opposes hierarchy and authority...
Everyone else views them as authoritarian enforcers of thoughtcrime.
Speaking of citing(and yes my castro claimed isn't proven) evidence where have you once cited evidence that Stalin,Mao,Ho Chi Minh, Robert Mugabe, Hugo Chavez were right-wing perverts?
How did they get it wrong?
By failing?
A quick aside, what forum were you proposing for debate?
You won't find a more egalitarian system of thought and governance than the jewish system and its descendants excluding of course the clerical-fascists(you know who you are!)