# What makes socialism good but Communism bad? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 15, 2015, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206 "2015-07-15T02:11:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![davida03801](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5e925/32.png) [@davida03801](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davida03801)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/21 "2015-07-16T12:39:55Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Socialism is usually linked with a democratically elected government, which prevents the excesses that dictatorships bring. Then what do you describe as the Chavez-Maduro style of getting democratically elected as Socialists then turning into dictators ? In a number of other places also. Just curious as to how they are classified. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/22 "2015-07-16T13:22:45Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > I’m neither a socialist nor a communist-I’m a social democrat and by any reasonable measure, Bernie Sanders is one too. At any rate, I fundamentally accept capitalism as the least evil of all socioeconomic systems devised by mankind although I advocate for a modified and tamed version of it in the form of the social market economy. Holy crap I agree with **Qin** all down the line of this post. > [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Capitalism isn’t a freaking religion it’s a useful tool if handled with extreme care. And this. Unbridled capitalism just hurts the majority of people, unless you happen to be one of the robber barons. Somehow we’ve got to thinking we’re all going to be robber barons, one day, just you watch! When in reality we aren’t. But people really do seem to worship capitalism. ---
**Author:** ![Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aji_de_gallina/32/260_2.png) [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aji_de_Gallina)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/23 "2015-07-16T15:18:34Z")
> [@Anaamika](#): > > And this. Unbridled capitalism just hurts the majority of people, unless you happen to be one of the robber barons. Somehow we’ve got to thinking we’re all going to be robber barons, one day, just you watch! When in reality we aren’t. But people really do seem to worship capitalism. Yup, cheaper products and services suck. What is “bridled capitalism” if not socialism? [In praise of the robbers barons.](http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2005/02/in_praise_of_ro.html?doing_wp_cron=1437059783.8718609809875488281250) ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/24 "2015-07-16T15:30:02Z")
> [@Aji\_de\_Gallina](#): > > What is “bridled capitalism” if not socialism? That poor middle. Always being excluded. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/25 "2015-07-16T15:51:19Z")
> [@](#): > > What makes socialism good but Communism bad? As noted it’s people’s perceptions and preconceptions of what those terms mean. In reality they are very similar in definition. It boils down to outcomes and how those political systems were applied in the real world. Most people associate ‘socialist’ countries and ‘socialism’ with places like Western Europe, while ‘communist’ and ‘communism’ is associated with countries like the USSR, North Korea, China, Cuba and the like. You can see right off how folks could get a good verse bad association with that since the outcomes were so different. Of course, most of the supposed ‘socialist’ countries in Western Europe are no such thing, but the strict definition of the term, and almost all of them have given up on socialist ECONOMIC policies long ago, since they don’t work very well. And many supposed ‘capitalist’ countries, like the US, have adopted socialist welfare type policies to soften capitalism and make it more palatable to the people, harnessing the economic engine to improve their citizens lives. Sander’s isn’t a socialist…he’s a liberal independent who considers himself a social democrat (and is trying to run as a Democrat for president). He advocates for more social programs and a tighter harness for capitalism, not an attempt to impose a socialist economic or property structure on the US, making him essentially a liberal who wants to push the buttons of conservatives like my dad by putting ‘social’ in his self identified political tag. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/26 "2015-07-16T17:36:55Z")
> [@HumbleThinker](#): > > Communism, a system based on communes, has a radically decentralized government. When people compare socialism to Communism, they are generally comparing socialism to Stalinism, which is actually antithetical to Communism proper. I think we’re talking here about real world communism, like that practiced by Lenin and Stalin and Mao, rather than imaginary communism. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/27 "2015-07-16T17:41:06Z")
> [@davida03801](#): > > Then what do you describe as the Chavez-Maduro style of getting democratically elected as Socialists then turning into dictators ? In a number of other places also. > > Just curious as to how they are classified. I’d call them dictators and I’d say dictatorial governments are generally bad. It doesn’t matter whether they started out on the left or the right. Governments work better when the governed people have the ability to stop the government from going too far. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/28 "2015-07-16T21:04:12Z")
> [@ITR\_champion](#): > > Of course, communists always claimed to be democrats, often even in the name of the country. East Germany was officially the “German Democratic Republic”. And the Nazis claimed to be socialists. So? ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [July 16, 2015, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/29 "2015-07-16T23:30:49Z")
> [@davida03801](#): > > Then what do you describe as the Chavez-Maduro style The “bolivarians” are primarily populist-nationalists who lean socialist and love using the socialist discourse to whip up support, because the pro-business parties discredited themselves splendidly. In the society in question the benefits of a modern liberal economy/liberal democracy failed to reach the mass of the population so it was easy to sell them on what good were those. Venezuela 1948-98 was a formal free market democracy and seemingly prosperous but the underclass was not feeling the prosperity. Then they appeal to populist sentiment to dismantle the structure of formal democracy before their very eyes, because “people’s” democracy is better. But back to the underlying question: socialism per se, like capitalism per se, is not the problem, it’s _what you do with it_. In our world and times, the word “communism” was adopted by the Marxist-Leninists and their totalitarian Stalinist/Maoist offshoots to describe themselves, and has been accepted generally to mean just that sort of system. So the communists seek to impose socialism through totalitarianism, ergo are bad. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2015, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/30 "2015-07-17T00:44:30Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And the Nazis claimed to be socialists. So? They didn’t claim to be, they were socialists, i.e. harnessing the means of production and distribution for the perceived good of the ‘people’. Hell, Hitler said that the Nazi’s were the enemy of Capitalists and thought Capitalism was evil (ironic, that) and a blight on the world. As JRDelirious says, it’s what you DO with the concepts, and Fascist, like Communists didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory wrt what they did with it. Which is why folks don’t exactly look kindly on Fascists today. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2015, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/31 "2015-07-17T01:12:38Z")
> [@XT](#): > > They didn’t claim to be, they were socialists, i.e. harnessing the means of production and distribution for the perceived good of the ‘people’. Hell, Hitler said that the Nazi’s were the enemy of Capitalists and thought Capitalism was evil (ironic, that) and a blight on the world. That was at the beginning, opportunist as Hitler was, that was a disposable position once power was reached with the help of the capitalists of Germany. > **[Fritz Thyssen : Nazi Germany](https://spartacus-educational.com/GERthyssen.htm)** > > Biography of Fritz Thyssen : Nazi Germany > [@XT](#): > > As JRDelirious says, it’s what you DO with the concepts, and Fascist, like Communists didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory wrt what they did with it. Which is why folks don’t exactly look kindly on Fascists today. Indeed, I’m just saying that we should not forget that the Nazis themselves got rid of the socialists in Germany too. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2015, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/32 "2015-07-17T01:18:48Z")
[QUOTE=GIGObuster] That was at the beginning, opportunist as Hitler was, that was a disposable position once power was reached with the help of the capitalists of Germany. [/QUOTE] Not really. Hitler certainly USED the capitalist types in Germany, but it was still about about harnessing the means of production and distribution for the use of Germany and the German people (well, the Nazis anyway). Your site is really talking about Nazi antipathy against the Left, and that is certainly true, but socialism, per se, didn’t have a left/right orientation like it does today. It’s an economic system, at it’s heart (or it was anyway), and could be either left or right wing, depending on how it was used and by whom. This isn’t to say that ‘capitalists’ (well, industrialists) in Germany didn’t make out like bandits (some of them anyway), or that many didn’t support Hitler. But that didn’t make Germany a capitalist economic nation by any means, nor did it operate as such under the Nazis either before or certainly not during the war. > [@](#): > > Indeed, I’m just saying that we should not forget that the Nazis themselves got rid of the socialists in Germany too. No, they got rid of leftists and communists. Those aren’t exactly the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 17, 2015, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206/33 "2015-07-17T01:47:40Z")
> [@XT](#): > > Not really. Hitler certainly USED the capitalist types in Germany, but it was still about about harnessing the means of production and distribution for the use of Germany and the German people (well, the Nazis anyway). Your site is really talking about Nazi antipathy against the Left, and that is certainly true, but socialism, per se, didn’t have a left/right orientation like it does today. It’s an economic system, at it’s heart (or it was anyway), and could be either left or right wing, depending on how it was used and by whom. > > This isn’t to say that ‘capitalists’ (well, industrialists) in Germany didn’t make out like bandits (some of them anyway), or that many didn’t support Hitler. But that didn’t make Germany a capitalist economic nation by any means, nor did it operate as such under the Nazis either before or certainly not during the war. The reality was that the German industrialists did choose the one that did in the end protect the corporations. > [@XT](#): > > No, they got rid of leftists and communists. Those aren’t exactly the same thing. Sorry, but this is wrong, The socialist party in Germany had to change its name because in the late 19th century the government banned them, they called themselves the Social Democratic Party of Germany. Hitler still saw through that. And knew who they were. For Germans it was one of the worst kept secrets, but somehow many narratives coming from the right nowadays want to forget that. As it is the idea that just because they called themselves socialists we should ignore that the Nazis returned the banks that were nationalized in the Weimar republic to their former owners and that the Nazis furnished slave labor to many companies. > **[Social Democratic Party of Germany](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Democratic_Party_of_Germany)** > > The Social Democratic Party of Germany (German: Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, \[zoˈtsi̯aːldemoˌkʁaːtɪʃə paʁˌtaɪ ˈdɔʏtʃlants\], SPD, .mw-parser-output .IPA-label-small{font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .references .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .infobox .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .navbox .IPA-label-small{font-size:100%}German pronunciation: \[ɛspeːˈdeː\] ⓘ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Es The ... > [@](#): > > After 1918 the SPD played an important role in the political system of the Weimar Republic, although it took part in coalition governments only in few years (1918–1921, 1923, 1928–1930).Adolf Hitler prohibited the party in 1933 under the Enabling Act – party officials were imprisoned, killed or went into exile. In exile, the party used the name Sopade. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-makes-socialism-good-but-communism-bad/725206.md?page=1)