Why is Communism So Opposed?

@Aquathunda,

Aquathunda wrote:

In America, we are raised to fear and hate communism, but doesn't communism go with our values when being raised in this country? When we are taught to share, why is a government based on sharing so scary?

Communism isn't government based on sharing. It's government based on forcing people to share---everything.

Aquathunda wrote:

When we are taught about loving thy neighbor, why can't we accept a society that consists of that idea?

Because love is an individual choice, not a mandatory government policy. "We" want to keep it like that.

Aquathunda wrote:

Communism is supported by many average American values, yet it is so incredibly "evil" in the view of our country. Why?

Again, the problem doesn't lie in the values. It lies the massive amounts of violence needed to enforce these values on all citizens who don't share them, or even just share them up to a point.

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

Aquathunda wrote:
In America, we are raised to fear and hate communism, but doesn't communism go with our values when being raised in this country? When we are taught to share, why is a government based on sharing so scary?

Communism isn't government based on sharing. It's government based on forcing people to share---everything.

Aquathunda wrote:
When we are taught about loving thy neighbor, why can't we accept a society that consists of that idea?

Because love is an individual choice, not a mandatory government policy. "We" want to keep it like that.

Aquathunda wrote:
Communism is supported by many average American values, yet it is so incredibly "evil" in the view of our country. Why?

Again, the problem doesn't lie in the values. It lies the massive amounts of violence needed to enforce these values on all citizens who don't share them, or even just share them only to a point.

I agree with all of the above statements but i would also like to add a few of my own.

sometimes people shirk their production when they know they can get things for free. some people will work hard because that's what they want to do but then others will not work as hard yet in a communist arena the hard worker gets just as much as the lazy bum, so how is that fair?

If the world turns completely socialist then our technology will go into the trash bin. People won't have any or at least very little incentive to invent or to strive for greatness because there is no reward at the other end. capitalism being a live in the world allows for creativity to thrive because there is a benefit for inventing and creating. take that away or pay a doctor the same wage as a garbage collector and you'll have more garbage collectors than doctors.

Who is going to do the dangerous jobs if they are risky and you get paid the same wage? Why should you take any risks if you are just going to get the same amount as everyone else?

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@Thomas,

Private property (e.g. the means of production) is based on forcing people to respect those property rights.

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@Mercer,

And yet, in practice, it turns out that private property needs no Gulag or Cultural Revolution to enforce. Even if there's no difference in principle (and I'm not saying that there isn't), there certainly is a vast difference in practice.

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@Thomas,

There were several revolutions to establish the present paradigm of the bourgeois conception of private property - notably in 1776 and 1789. If you don't respect the private property of others you go to prison. Here's an interesting graph...

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/US_incarceration_timeline-clean.svg

Can we call it a Gulag yet? Granted most of this is the result on the so called war on drugs but this too is about private property. The poor are more likely to become drug dealers than the rich - and certainly more likely to be go to prison for dealing drugs.

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@Mercer,

Mercer wrote:

There were several revolutions to establish the present paradigm of the bourgeois conception of private property - notably in 1776 and 1789.

Not so. In 1776 and 1789, private property had been the law for centuries in England and her colonies, and in France respectively. The opposite of what you say is true: These republican revolutions abolished private property in the business of governing countries. None of them privatized anything that had previously belonged to "We, the People". You can plausibly blame these revolutions for failing to abolish enough private property; you can't blame them for introducing any.

Mercer wrote:

Can we call it a Gulag yet? Granted most of this is the result on the so called war on drugs but this too is about private property. The poor are more likely to become drug dealers than the rich - and certainly more likely to be go to prison for dealing drugs.

As you say yourself, the drug business is an industry of private companies competing in a free market. Therefore, the War on Drugs is many things, but it isn't a campaign to promote private enterprise. It's a campaign to suppress certain kinds of private enterprise. (Which is why most libertarians vigorously oppose it.)

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

As you say yourself, the drug business is an industry of private companies competing in a free market.

... well ... what would be a free market if the government let it be---which it doesn't.

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@Aquathunda,

Aquathunda wrote:

When we are taught to share, why is a government based on sharing so scary?

If I have a garden that I worked hard on all year and you've done nothing, why should I share my harvest with you? Forcing me to do so seems pretty "evil".

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

Thomas wrote:
As you say yourself, the drug business is an industry of private companies competing in a free market.

... well ... what would be a free market if the government let it be---which it doesn't.

Maybe you think that private companies shouldn't be regulated and that we should get rid of all safety inspectors, all employment laws, etc?

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@Night Ripper,

Night Ripper wrote:

Maybe you think that private companies shouldn't be regulated and that we should get rid of all safety inspectors, all employment laws, etc?

I didn't say that. I responded to Mercer's implication that imprisoning drug dealers is a pro-capitalist policy. My response is that as far as imprisoning drug dealers affects private enterprises at all, it suppresses them---which is consistent with communism, but inconsistent with laissez-faire capitalism. This is an objective fact, regardless of the economic system one champions.

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@Thomas,

1776 and 1789 were bourgeoisie revolutions in that they brought about changes in governmental paradigm from aristocratic to the bourgeoisie. Aristocrats have Kings. The bourgeoisie have Presidents and CEO's. This shift also represents the dominance of the corresponding way of thinking about property and labor and the change of the ruling class from the aristocratic to the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie takeover was relatively gradual up till then but it finally erupted into revolution. Through platitudes and flattery the bourgeoisie were able to convince the proletariat to join their side against the aristocracy. The philosophy was democratic but the power was in the hands of the bourgeoisie. Nevertheless, many still take the philosophy of "all men created equal" and "Liberté, égalité, fraternité," seriously...ultimately much to the chagrin of the bourgeoisie. Indeed the belief in democracy is among the many seeds of destruction inherent in the capitalist system.

Quote:

As you say yourself, the drug business is an industry of private companies competing in a free market. Therefore, the War on Drugs is many things, but it isn't a campaign to promote private enterprise. It's a campaign to suppress certain kinds of private enterprise. (Which is why most libertarians vigorously oppose it.)

You didn't seem to get what I was saying. The more lucrative forms of legal private enterprise (i.e. that which doesn't involve selling ones labor for an hourly wage, that which requires a college diploma, that which requires connections, etc.) is not accessible to the poor so they opt for illegal private enterprise. Another type of illegal private enterprise is theft. One can just as easily say that laws against theft suppress a certain kind of private enterprise. What is legal property and what is illegal property (e.g. drugs, theft) is determined by the ruling class.

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Where I've worked there has been people who are lazy and hardly work, and they get paid the same as me. Not to mention, that its a common frustration of most people of the working class(blue collar/middle to lower class). I live in a Capitalist society, and such arguements against it always come from people of the upper class, business owners and the like... which are a minority, who hold that economic freedom is individual freedom, which is peculiar considering the innate indifference of the whole system.
The poor attitude is often held at the basis of established regimes such as Stalinism, and Maoism... whom defy what we find most important in life, the right to facets of our individual freedom, which is most strongly represented in our right to believe, speak etc. Thats why I feel its opposed, the economic implications, I applaud( at this stage, theoretically Wink

, but China ain't doing so bad).

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@Mercer,

Mercer wrote:

1776 and 1789 were bourgeoisie revolutions in that they brought about change in governmental paradigm from aristocratic class to the bourgeoisie class.

The question for this thread was, "why is communism so opposed?" Why do vast majorities in the Western world reject a legal system of mostly-communal property, preferring private property instead? France's and England's legal systems protected private property both before and after those revolutions. So how are the revolutions of 1776 and 1789 relevant to the topic of this thread? They aren't. No matter how much Marxist jargon you wrap them into, neither revolution tilted the balance between private and communal property.

Mercer wrote:

Another type of illegal private enterprise is theft. One can just as easily say that laws against theft suppress a certain kind of private enterprise.

No, one cannot---not as easily. Theft, by definition, threatens property rights of the person stolen from. Drug dealing, by contrast, threatens nobody's property rights at all. It's a mutually consensual transaction. The property rights of individuals, unlike their pharmacological abstinence, are indispensible to the private-enterprise system's legal foundation. That makes for a crucial difference between drug dealing and stealing.

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@Thomas,

Quote:

So how are the revolutions of 1776 and 1789 relevant to the topic of this thread? They aren't.

Yes they are! Baring some extreme revisions to history it is very relevant. 1776, 1789, 1884, 1871, 1917, 1968, and many other dates are all very relevant to the original post.

Quote:

Theft, by definition, threatens property rights of the person stolen from. Drug dealing, by contrast, threatens nobody's property rights at all. It's a mutually consensual transaction. The property rights of individuals, unlike their pharmacological abstinence, are indispensible to the private-enterprise system's legal foundation. That makes for a crucial difference between drug dealing and stealing.

Consensual transaction? Wittingly? Suppose one party finds out later that they got a raw deal. Willingly? Do both parties in this consensual transaction begin on equal footing? Suppose one party has the upper hand; this would be a "crucial difference" between the two parties.

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Why does America opposes socialism in its widest sense ,that should be the question. It can not differentiate between the autocratic communist states such as soviet Russia and a modern democratic state government such as Norway. It has a dogmatic view that for many is built in to their psyche. The morals of communism are very similar to christian teachings, its the undemocratic execution and the lack of freedom to choose that has giving it such a bad name. No one would say a Kibbutz or a monastery was a restriction of freedom but they work on basically the same ideology, communism proclaims.

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@xris,

xris wrote:

Why does America opposes socialism in its widest sense ,that should be the question.

You keep doing this xris. You keep rehashing the same question and completely ignore the fact that it has been pointed out to you dozens of times already that socialism will stagnate productivity. Under socialist arena it actually rewards laziness and unproductive people which strips away the incentive for those who do add to society and are productive. If a person who puts all their energy into creating and moving forward technology gets the same reward as a person who slacks their education and tries to skimp out of doing any work what so ever, what is the incentive to even try or become anything? There is absolutely none.

Who is going to want to do a dangerous job if they get the same thing as a person who slacks off on flipping burgers? It makes no sense. The world will devolve if all nations become socialists. The only reason it has not happened yet is because there are still nations that are not fully socialists. I guarantee that if the US takes the final step toward socialism then advances in technology will halt almost completely.

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@Krumple,

And you constantly reaffirm the blinkered view a lot of Americans have of socialism..You have done it again , you are confusing communism with democratic socialism, you refuse to acknowledge there is a difference. Socialism and social reforms have been in European political history for nearly a century, with no major disasters or the removal of these freedoms. Technology has not been restricted in Europe nor does America have the exclusive ability to succeed in the field of science..Natural ability and inclination decides the work we labour in. Socialism does not dictate or give free rides to those who lay idle. Your views of socialism are outdated and comical.

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@Aquathunda,

Aquathunda wrote:

In America, we are raised to fear and hate communism, but doesn't communism go with our values when being raised in this country? When we are taught to share, why is a government based on sharing so scary? When we are taught about loving thy neighbor, why can't we accept a society that consists of that idea?

Communism is supported by many average American values, yet it is so incredibly "evil" in the view of our country. Why?

It was slavery, enforced by terror and murder.

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@Aquathunda,

Communism is an excellent idea in concept. Why we are so opposed to it is merely because of all the "red scare" propaganda. However, this does not mean that communism could ever exist. It has never existed and will never exist because any time anyone has used communistic ideals to persuade a people in a certain direction, it has lead to tyrannical rule.
As far as socialism goes, the US is a semi-socialist country already. We have socialized safety systems, schools, financial aid, health care (medicaid, at least), prison systems, and parks. I'm sure I'm leaving some things out. Yes, these systems don't always work well. But, imagine if there was incentive for people to actually give the right drug to the right person force the right reason instead of giving the most expensive drug to someone who doesn't need it? Wouldn't that just be nice...

One last note- communism is not about forcing everyone to do something they don't want to do. It's about encouraging individual freedom to do what you love. Capitalism, in its currently corrupt state, is all about conformity to company ideals and mass markets. That's just sad.

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Why is Communism So Opposed?

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