Apart from people being selfish and greedy, why is communism supposed to be evil and nasty?
The Soviet Union was a communism, so the Americans dislike it.
Well, they had a nasty tendency to round up people who disagreed with them. Then ---- mass graves. 
Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor
That was communists not communism . Lets make that distinction right up front.
Communism (in Russia) was a failed attempt to govern according to socialist principles. Noble principles they are too “from each according to his means and to each according to his needs”.
The reason communism failed (in Russia) is because of human nature and our natural propensity for greed.
Now Capitalism…theres a system that works oh yeah!
>> The reason communism failed (in Russia) is because of human nature and our natural propensity for greed
You think only in Russia? How about China? Millions died during the cultural revolution. How about Cuba? How about North Korea? How about any commmunist country? I do not know of any communist country that has not been a failure in every sense but most notably in suppressing people’s freedoms.
If people cannot live in small communes because some of them will take advantage of the others, I cannot imagine a country with millions of benevolent people where they all produce their best for the good of the country and all are content with whatever the government gives them.
When people start grumbling then it’s time to label them counterrevolutionaries and kill them. Every communist country has done this and failed to show anything good for it. Coincidence? You decide.
A for capitalism it may have its problems but compared to communism it’s close to perfect. All the rich nations on the globe have a capitalist system. Coincidence? You decide.
People CAN live in small communes. Around where I live, there are many Hutterite colonies that are communist. They work out fine. Communism isn’t the problem in Communist countries. It’s the greed of the people.
Yep. The concept of greed naturally leads to capitalism, of course, and that’s bad for communist countries. Consequently, the communist leaders (and there aren’t supposed to be real “leaders” in true communism) must form an extremely oppressive form of government (USSR, China, Cuba, N. Korea, 'Nam, etc). It was (and still is, to a large extent) the mission of the US to stop the spread of communism because
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It sucks, the regime kills dissidents, human rights are taken away, it’s fundamentally unhealthy economic policy
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It’s a threat to the American way of life, which I quite enjoy.
During the Cold War, the CIA largely focused on instigating rebellions in small communist countries and putting friendly dictators in place (or rigging ‘elections’). Remember the Bay of Pigs? Ouch.
**sailor wrote:
If people cannot live in small communes because some of them will take advantage of the others, I cannot imagine a country with millions of benevolent people where they all produce their best for the good of the country and all are content with whatever the government gives them.**
The Kibbutzim of Isreal stand in stark contrast to this statment. Their economic success varies, but they’re some of the safest places to live in Isreal.
Capitalism is hardly perfect, either. Thousands, if not millions died in sweatshops and mills with unsafe working conditions and a pittance for wages. And many of the victims were children.
Before calling the pot black, the kettle ought to remember its own history.
Communism: The grand theory that has never worked. Saying that it only fails because of greed is akin to saying that the only reason a rock won’t fly is gravity. Those ‘little things’ are called reality. Getting off my soapbox, I doubt Communism will ever work as a governmental system. Marx himself knew that. Marx said that Communism would either result in Utopian Socialism (a type of Anarchy) or fall back to Capitalism. In all Communist countries a third route has been taken: Totalitarianism usually based around a personality cult of a charismatic strongman (Stalin in the Soviet Union, Mao in China, Kim Il Sung in North Korea, Castro in Cuba, etc.) that leads to a violent, opressive bureaucratic regime. In short, it does not work and it has never worked.
If one wants a lengthy analysis of the many problems inherent in communism, I would recommend F. A. Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom. In it he shows how central planning is incompatible with individual freedom for a variety of different reasons.
I don’t think he mentions the one reason that, regardless of freedom, communism is not viable in any society, even one without greed. The price system is essential for communicating information about the value of various things. It is impossible for a centrally planned economy to ensure that all the necessary information is taken into account.
In a relatively free market, prices are used to transmit to everyone the information they need to determine what and how much to produce. In a centrally planned economy, a single entity must be able to make informed decisions with regard to the production and distribution of everything. For a large scale economy, the amount of information required is simply too large for anyone to comprehend fully.
The Amish have been practicing communism (small c) for generations. In addition to practicing an economic system they are practicing their religion.
Communism (capital C) as preached by Marx never had much economic theory in it. The Communist Manifesto has some great sound bites and looks good on paper. In actual practice it doesn’t work. At least, not the way Marx imagined it.
The Marx book was commissioned by a publisher who thought it would make a good read. Marx was not an economic genius.
He was a hack writer living in poverty with an ax to grind against everyone who had more than he did.
Communism works fine, if you are a colony of bees! It’s only when human individualism is present that the system falls short. By nature, some of us do not like to be told what to do. Others are quite content to be drones.
Long live freedom! I refuse to be a drone! But then, I’m an American citizen, the greatest nation in the world.
It is sad that in a recent questionaire, the majority of students thought that “From each according to his means, To each according to his needs” is part of our Constitution.
“Wake Up America” Earl Pitts
One little point that I haven’t seen mentioned is the factor of religion.
Communism (big C)does not allow public religious worship (“religion is the opiate of the people…” yadda yadda yadda). Of course, this directly oppresses people’s freedoms to worship as they seem fit–which can certainly be seen as evil.
(little c) communism, in the examples previously given in this thread, works with people who have a common thread of religious worship. People such as the Hutterites, and the Kibbutzim can make communism work for them, because they all (generally) have the same work ethic and beliefs.
Also, with big C: the gov’t said that everyone was getting equal slices of the pie, when in reality greed Party members were getting their bigger pieces first, then distributing the rest. And out of that, they naturally had to kill or imprison the dissidents that saw the truth.
Homer Simpson: “Oh, sure Marge, in theory. In theory, Communism works. In theory.”
Need to get oldscratch and Olentzero here to present the pro-communist side. Then the tread can get moved to GD.
I was thinking the same thing about the Comrade Dopers, Gilligan.
I don’t think oldscratch is a Communist.
Socialist, yes.
IIRC, I do believe that oldscratch is Socialist, but I’m sure he’d have something interesting to say here.
yes, in a small scale and where people are willing to give up a lot of freedom, communism might work. Especially if those who don’t like it are free to leave as is the case in the examples mentioned. In those examples people are very closely scrutinized by those around them and, while they are assured the full support of the group, nobody is allowed to slack off and live off the group without contributing. And it is pretty much impossible to cheat because everybody knows you. This is very different from a socialist state where people cheat the welfare system continously because they are entitled to government help by law. I would much prefer the small scale voluntary “communist” system than the large scale government system.
Communism doesn’t even work in theory, for the information transmission problems mentioned above render it terribly inefficient.
Very small scale communes and Kibbutzes work because A) The population is homogeneous and has the same goals, and B) The population is small enough that communication is not a problem. Note that even Hutterites resort to capitalism the minute they take their transactions outside of their own small group. When two colonies deal with each other, or when they deal with the outside world, they resort to capitalism.
And BTW, most communes are not true communist societies, because they almost always have a group of elders or other authority figures to maintain their direction. They have their dissidents, but they typically just leave. If the whole country is communist, leaving is no longer an option.
The list of theoretical AND practical reasons why communism can’t work is very long. Then we have the empirical evidence: Every attempt at implementing it has been a dismal failure.
So what’s left? Why can’t this miserable, evil, failed political system die? It belongs on the ash heap of history.