The real choice is capitalism or democracy.
Comment on You have nothing to lose but your brains
lastlybutfirstly@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
I never understood why we’re stuck with just capitalism or communism, two economic systems developed before railroads were a thing and written down at night by candle light or a lantern burning whale fat. I think we should come up with something better. To quote President Not Sure, “The water doesn’t have to come from the toilet, but that’s the general idea.”
Fedizen@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
These aren’t opposites. Democracy is a system of governance, capitalism is a system of economics. A society can be both at the same time.
Fedizen@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Things don’t need to be opposites to affect each other in predictable ways.
They are both decision making processes where different groups hold power over society’s resources. Democracy very much has economic power and Capitalism is very much about who gets to make certain decisions.
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
That’s how all societies work though. We live in a world where sacristy is reality, and therefore there will always be people competing to control the same limited resources.
Riverside@reddthat.com 2 weeks ago
You cannot have real democracy when there is a ruling minority class, as in capitalism, simple as that.
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Europe has figured it out so has New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Japan, and so on. In fact, only capitalist systems have ever produced genuine democracies. All the socialist examples in history were authoritarian governed by an unelected ruling elite.
captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
I can list at least one.
Can’t think of a communist democracy, though.
moustachio@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
To be fair, any of the counties that attempted it had a coup enacted by fascist capitalist countries to prevent them from doing so.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz 2 weeks ago
We can measure how democratic a country is by how much its actions favor the people rather than the capitalists. Most communist countries, particularly Cuba are more democratic than any country ruled by capital.
bunchberry@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Everyone who advocates for a “third way” always just ends up advocating for capitalism.
merdaverse@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Railways were a thing when communism was developing during Marx’s times and Lenin wrote extensively about railways. Their analysis is still very valid, and if anything, planning has become more feasible than 100 years ago thanks to computers. There are some modern proposals, but they are still very much based on socialism, since capitalism can only lead us to ruin.
captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
I’m all ears for ideas.
lastlybutfirstly@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
So am I! I just can’t believe Adam Smith and Karl Marx are the Einstein and Newton of economics. It feels like capitalism and communism are the luminiferous ether and fluid theory of electricity and we never bothered advanced any further.
captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 2 weeks ago
To paraphrase Tim Curry, communism and capitalism are both red herrings.
Oh that big punch up between the Soviet Union and the United States, decadent capitalism vs brutalist communism. Who won? According to the scoreboard as of 2026: Israel.
The catch phrase I’ve always heard about communism is “the people own the means of production.” Has that ever been true in practice? Did Soviet citizens own any piece of the means of production? Did anything resembling “from each according to his ability, to each according to his need” ever once happen under the hammer and sickle? Or was that the false narrative the idiot asshole in charge used to cow the unwashed masses?
Similar questions could be asked of my fellow capitalist Americans. Capitalism is allegedly about the free market, supply and demand, if there is a demand someone will provide a supply, probably multiple someones, competitors will compete, those who do it faster, cheaper or better will succeed until someone else does it even fasterer, cheaperer and betterer repeat until someone else comes along with a completely different idea, welcome to the infinite cycle of meritocracy where the cream rises to the top. How’s that working out? Some substance has risen to the top, not sure it’s cream.
A common problem I see between the Soviet Union and the United States: Weak systems for preventing psychotic despots from ruining it all.
bunchberry@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Technically aether theory was never ruled out. People love to claim that the Michelson-Morley experiment ruled it out, but this is historical revisionism. The MM experiment was conducted in 1887. Hendrik Lorentz proposed his aether model in 1904. Obviously Lorentz was not such a moron he would not take into account the findings of MM, but that is what people are unironically suggesting when they say MM somehow retrocausally ruled out his model.
Lorentz’s aether model and Einstein’s relativity are actually mathematically equivalent so they make all the same predictions, so no possible experiment could rule out Lorentz’s aether theory that would not also rule out Einstein’s relativity. Indeed, if you read his 1905 paper where Einstein introduces special relativity, his criticism of Lorentz’s model is only a philosophical objection. He never posited that an experiment can rule it out.
I would recommend also checking out John Bell’s paper “How to Teach Special Relativity,” where he also discusses this fact, and how the mathematics of special relativity are perfectly consistent with a reality with an absolute space and time. Taking space and time to be relative only comes at the level of metaphysical interpretation.
electric_nan@lemmy.ml 2 weeks ago
“It’s socialism or barbarism!”. It’s because there hasn’t been any other convincing arguments otherwise. If you give the capitalists an inch, they’ll eventually take it all. You cannot allow capital to accumulate to the degree that it wields real political power.
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Socialism hasn’t exactly worked out either. Replacing a flawed system like capitalism with something even worse is not a solution
Fedizen@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
“Socialism hasn’t worked out either” what exactly do you mean? Public schools have largely been more successful than not. Socialized medicine has been more successful than privatized insurance.
The blanket statement is simply a statement so sweeping it can only be incorrect. Because there are successful socialized portions of societies.
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
But that’s not what socialism is. Socialism is when the “public” (read: government) controls all of societies land, resources, and means of production and distributes them from ability to need. Socialism is a specific economic system where the entire economy is centrally planned.
Regdok@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
squak socialism bad squak
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
It is. You can smack your head against a wall, but reality won’t change.
reksas@sopuli.xyz 2 weeks ago
Rich cant exploit socialism as easily, therefore they demonize it.
Gorilladrums@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Socialism is a failure because it shifts the wealthy class from private individuals with a lot of influence to the actual ruling elite. Therefore the exploitation is happening by the very people running the economy. We saw this happen time and time again in socialist countries.