Fear of the Socialism Bogeyman is a Strawman

The BBQ Pit
1

I’m not much of an active poster, but I do read a lot of the debate threads here and I’ve been a bit troubled by a recent trend. It seems that when someone voices an opinion against expansion of government controls, the opposition will accuse the person of merely being afraid of the socialism bogeyman. If a person opposes a program or the extent to which it would be enacted (UHC being the prime example), they are accused of opposing all government programs and pilloried. If someone opposes tax increases, they are accused of being against all taxes and ridiculed for it. I’ve seen a growing number of sarcastic “SOCIALISMOHNO!!!11” responses.

The fact of the matter is that someone can be generally against the expansion of government power without necessarily opposing all government programs. If you think the government shouldn’t enact UHC, it doesn’t automatically follow that you oppose government running police and fire departments. If you think taxes shouldn’t be raised, it doesn’t automatically follow that you think you shouldn’t have to pay any taxes.

Just because there are some crazies who oppose your view does not mean that the particular person arguing across from you is one of them.

Strawmanning isn’t anything new and certainly not limited to any one side of the debate, but this seems to have become a particularly widespread form of it. Yes, there are some people (and yes, even some SDMB posters) who probably are legitimately scared by the mere term “socialism,” but such accusations are being thrown about too lightly and given too much credence. Anyways, that’s just my opinion.

2

I’ve actually seen the opposite from your OP. There are FAR more people, even here, who casually throw around the term Socialism to describe any government program at all than those who accuse anyone opposed to them of falsely fearing socialism.

Granted, there are a handful of people on the SDMB who might do what you are describing in the OP, but unlike the right-wing version, I cannot firmly remember any of them actually doing it.

Accusing the Democrats of being socialists, on the other hand, happens so often that it’s hard to read even this message board without seeing it every day.

Do you have any specific examples? I ask partially as a challenge, partly to read them and agree with you, and partly just to satisfy my own curiousity as to whether they are the same user names I had in mind in my second paragraph :slight_smile:

3

This is not the only board I read. I lurk at one board where virtually everyone believes that if it’s not specifically stated in the Constitution, then the government can’t do it. So any government program is Socialist, and all Democrats want to turn the U.S. into the Soviet Union. Many or most will concede that cops and firemen and roads and, especially, the military need to be paid for collectively because they’re ‘good for the country’. But anything else that is good for the country is Socialism because they don’t believe it’s good for the country. Most went to, or sent their kids to, public schools. But by and large they see public schools as hotbeds of Socialism meant to indoctrinate children into the Marxist fold. The Republicans and Democrats are in cahoots (though they’ll support Republicans, since they don’t want to steal as much of their money as the Democrats do), and the only one who can save the country is Ron Paul.

These people are incapable of rational debate. Anyone who suggests that UHC is good, or that maybe it would be better for the economy if more people had money to buy things than fewer people, or that gays should be allowed to marry, or that the world might have been formed sometime before the Fourth of July, 4004 BC (or uses BCE instead of BC) is automatically shouted down as a Marxist Socialist who wants to Destroy America, and a sheep who only listens to his Marxist Masters. Anyone who doesn’t believe that Obama is an illegal alien Marxist Socialist Islamo-Fascist is deluded.

As was seen during the Presidential campaign and the recent Town Hall Meetings, there are a lot of these people. So it’s not surprising that when someone claims that the Master Plan is to turn the U.S. into the USSR, they’re mocked with shouts of ‘ZOMBSOCIALISM!!!11!’

4

Creeping socialism is a valid concern, but people who spout willful ignorance are just creeps.

5

You are not alone: Can we put a moratorium on the word “socialist”? Pretty please?

Unfortunately, there are a handful of very prolific posters who drop “socialist” or “theft” into just about any thread. They’re borderline trolls and have never taken things beyond a sixth-grade explanation or justification for their thoughts.

There is also a group of prolific posters who have explained themselves in the past–as in have cogently explained what they mean. However, given the number of threads they participate in don’t take the time to cut-n-paste the same amount of thought into each post.

Of course, the opposite is true as well.

What sucks is that the Right Wing Marketing Machine has been pushing “socialist” as an insult/bogeyman quite hard. This has severely limited debate, and added quite a knee-jerk aspect to both sides.

6

That’s what James Madison believed. I guess he was a kook, too.

7

Cite? I’d say oh-so-clever pre-empting is far more common, at least in GD.

8

Well, there’s socialism and then there’s socialism. Socialism ≠ (necessarily) USSR or PRK. I’ve been to Japan (when I was very young), England, Belgium, Italy, Austria, Germany, Denmark, and Sweden. They seem to work pretty well, and they are not totalitarian Socialist states. I don’t see them becoming so.

From what I’ve read elsewhere, I surmise that the issues these ‘creeps’ (as you call them) have are: 1) They’ll take our guns! 2) They want to ban God! 3) They want to steal our money and give it to illegal aliens and criminals! 4) They want to control our lives!

For #1, and speaking as someone who has a collection of firearms, I agree that this is a concern. But even in socialist Western Europe people hunt. In the U.S. there are firearms that have been strictly regulated for three quarters of a century, and people can still get them legally (subject to state laws). When I lived in L.A. I was required to register certain items in my collection, and no jack-booted thugs came to confiscate them. Do I want more regulation? No. But I’m not worried that my collection will be confiscated if I do register them.

For #2, all we want to do is leave religion to the People. By the First Amendment, the State has no business putting religion into schools, nor establishing one religion as superior to any other. Practice whatever religion you want to; but teach it to your kids at home or at your place of worship – not in public schools.

#3. The government is supposed to ‘promote the general welfare’. That is, they are supposed to do the most good for the greatest number of people. We’ve had a socialist mandate from the beginning. Some people want absolute freedom, but only as much responsibility as they feel like giving. It doesn’t work that way. If I want to drive on a public road, I have to pay my share to build and maintain it. And public roads, like public schools and police- and fire departments, are for the public good – the ‘general welfare’. Many of us believe that UHC is also for the public good, and by extension good for the country and good for the economy. We don’t want to ‘steal’ anyone’s money. We want people to pay their fair share of the benefits they receive.

#4. No they don’t. It makes absolutely no sense to become the PRK. Ain’t gonna happen.

9

I believe that too. 10th amendment:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor
prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively,
or to the people.”

10

Wow… it’s almost as you’re mocking the OP. So, you advocate for a strict Madisonian Constitutional interpretation, one that holds the Tenth Amendment as sacrosanct as the First?

OK then. Not a knee-jerky or extreme view there. Nope. While I’m sure some militias out there would find it quite nice, rolling back the Federal government to pre-Marbury v. Madison days is patently absurd. Asking if you’d abolish, say, any random agency (FAA?) or any Supreme Court case (Brown?) isn’t strawmaning, it’s pointing out the obvious ridiculousness of such an idea.

11

Why would it be ridiculous? What’s wrong with the federal government dissolving agencies and letting the states take over those rolls? Seems very reasonable to me. I think most of the Framers would agree.

For the record, I think most federal government agencies are unconstitutional. I think most should be shut down. These include the Department of Education, Department of Labor, the EPA, Department of Commerce, and the NIH. I also think Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security should be eliminated.

12

There’s a hell of a lot of things the Framers would have disagreed with. For example, giving women and blacks the right to vote. You think those should have been decided by the states? :dubious:
I think Brown showed us EXACTLY the problem with just leaving it up to the states. Something had to be done, and the federal government had to step in, since the state government wasn’t about to do jack.

Times change. People change. And thus, government has to change. Or it fails.

13

I’m not trying to get into a pissing contest with you over your views – have fun with your weekend militia :rolleyes:

I was reacting to how you pretty much missed the entire point of the OP and went straight to showboatypants.

14

It must suck to wake up every day and realize your most cherished beliefs will never, ever come to pass.

15

Waitaminnit, now, if you accept that premise then practically any (federal) government program is unconstitutional; but unconstitutional != socialist. Where do they get that?!

16

You want to know why? Here’s why:

17

I think you may have answered your own question:

18

This is essentially the entire point of a constitution. Governments grow and give themselves power and the cycle feeds on itself until eventually it grows oppressive and is revolted against.

The founders were attempting to buck the historical trend by instead instituting a government that had very specific limitations. They would only have certain powers specifically enumerated in a constitution, and could not pass laws or take actions that were not specifically provisioned to it.

What the hell is the point of having a constitution if not that?

This specifically refers to the federal constitution and hence the federal limitations of powers. State constitutions can vary in what power they grant to their state governments.

None of this logically follows. Things the government does that are disallowed by the constitution are unconstitutional, not inherently socialist.

There may be people who espouse the views you list here, but that does not mean that the idea that a constitution is meaningful is inherently linked to whatever some nutcases believe and therefore is discredited by association.

The constitution specifically enumerates voting by women and minorities - everyone eligible over 18.

You see, that’s the whole point of the amendment process. If we collectively decide that we should grant the federal government new powers or make fundamental changes to the way our government operates, we can amend the federal constitution to reflect that. Universal suffrage is an example of the constitution working properly.

Which is what we should be doing - instead of simply ignoring the constitution and passing any law the federal government wishes, all potential federal laws should be granted authority under a specific section of the constitution. If you need a new power, then amend yourself one, don’t just grant it by fiat.

19

I choose to consider the intention of the Framers, which they stated in the Preamble. The Preamble is not Law, as the Constitution is; but it does provide an insight as to what the Framers were shooting for. Since the Framers explicitly stated that they wished to promote the general welfare, I take that to mean that they wished to promote the general welfare.

Which is what I said. These are views espoused by the Ron Paul-types at another board.

20

What can’t “promote the general welfare” include?

Why even have a constitution, if all we need to know is that the government’s goal is to promote the general welfare?

The preamble expresses an intent to what purpose the constitution will serve. It intends to create a limited government that protects the rights of its citizens. Obviously their intent was to create a government which would serve the general welfare of society. This is a description of what the rest of the constitution is attempting to do, not a power-granting mechanism.

To latch onto “promote general welfare” as to justify anything the government wants to do with good intent is to invalidate the rest of the constitution. Again, what purpose does a constitution serve in your world view?

Which is an attempt to try to discredit the idea by association. What if I were to say “these people believe we should take all the money the rich have and scatter it by airdrop over town square, that everyone should have to wear Harrison Bergeron style handicaps so that no one is better than anyone else, and that everyone should have government provided health care”? Sure, someone may hold all of those views, but you’re attempting to discredit the idea of government health care by associating it with other wingnut ideas.

You’re saying, blatantly, that these people that believe this stuff can’t be reasoned with, and part of the stuff you’re talking about is that the constitution has purpose.