Metal Reviews

That is a false dichotomy!

So you equate leftism with communism?

Please don't quote massive images guys, it's a pain scrolling through them twice.

Not necessarily. But one look at DM's avatar ought to spell it out for you.
And, the extreme left is just as retarded as the extreme right.
I can't believe that I even have to say this to an adult, but

Life

Isn't

Fair.

No problemo.

Ok, extremes are never good, we know that. But the left extreme emerged from a genuine desire for justice formulated in political terms by relatively recent philosophers who had at their disposal (and who took advantage of) an enormous heritage of ethical, political, etc thought, whereas the extreme right developed out of the rich and powerful minority's desire to maintain their status as the rich and powerful. I agree that when applied, Communism doesn't work, but ideologically I respect it a lot more than I do rich people who want to stay in control.

Hence, my idea that some kind of common sense approach taking the good parts from each respective ideology and applying them systematically is the best way.
Something being good on paper is all well and good, I suppose, but the gulf between theory and practice is immense.

Or in other words, society can't survive completely selfishly or completely selflessly. Obviously, ideally, everyone would live only for the good of his fellow man, but that's not how we roll, being the most murderous animals on the planet.

But that's exactly what modern leftism is, at least what it seems to be in the US. The economic model, for example, is based on the keynesian compromise between the entirely planned out approach of Communism with the free market, i.e. a free market with regulated government intervention to make sure no one falls through the cracks. As for social values... Well, there really shouldn't be any argument there, right? "Your rights end where mine begin".

Dreams (utopian or otherwise) are for the sleeping.

And besides that, why should a person that goes to bed early every night, gets up before the sun, rain or shine and goes to work at a job he most likely hates pay for some brood mare, waking up some time around lunch time to sit around all day (what's left of it, at least) watching Maury fucking Povich and stuffing their face with Government subsidized junk food, after staying up all night drinking beer, and playing hide the salami, whilst the kids run amok? Or pay for somebody that would rather pursue some dream instead of get a job? that's BS, no matter how you slice it.
Life consists of choices; nobody OWES anybody a goddamned thing. At some point, personal responsibility has to take hold.

Yes, in theory... but the human factor always seems to have a way of corrupting everything it touches.
As for social issues: live and let live, sez I, just don't piss down my back and tell me it's raining.

Leftism was never about selflessness. It was about framing self-interest in social terms rather than individual ones.

i.e. the right of an individual to accumulate property and wealth should not trump the rights of communities/workers to control their own environment.

This is what has been totally lost nowadays. Government-enforced "equality" (i.e. equal wages, redistributive income) would have been an alien concept to radical socialists back in the day. They were interested in control itself. Workers should decide amongst themselves how their factories operate, and what is done with the generated resources. It is because this was crushed by existing power structures that leftists have switched their sights to this kind of compromise.

We have become so used to the means of production being owned on an individual basis, that we see everything through an individualist prism. Hence, the antidote to wealth and power is "selflessness": i.e. supressing some primeval urge to wealth.

But when you imagine a situation where a factory is controlled by its workers on a collective basis, negating the profit motive becomes not simply an act of surpressing your selfish impulses, but imperative for your own self interest. Because you depend on your links with others and to your community, and need to nurture these if you are to have access to the resources of others.

Communism is indeed a failed ideology, generally because of the extreme hostility shown to any and all emerging communist nations by the world powers of capitalism.

If you can name one country that became communist or elected a truly socialist leader prior to the collapse of the USSR that was not subsequently screwed over ten ways from Sunday by trade embargos and clandestine operations by the CIA, then I will continue the conversation along these particular lines.

I don't think that that is a complete view of things, though.
Every country that the USSR took into it's fold was the worse for it,
whether or not the CIA (every commie's favorite scapegoat... the KGB was countering the CIA at every possible turn I would imagine, after all) had there hands in clandestine operations or not. What difference does that really make?
Communism lost. It could not keep up with capitalism.
I am by no means a staunch capitalist (in the sense that I would imagine you see the word, though I do believe that a free market is best), but it was the more dominant ideology. It works.
It works because with a little ingenuity, hard work and sacrifice, anybody can succeed financially.
Why should lazy parasites be on equal financial terms with people that work hard, go to school and make personal sacrifice?
A custodian should be in the same strata as, say, a surgeon?

And just look at the quality of life in free trade / capitalist countries compared to communist. Besides the abject poverty, there are human rights issues, lack of freedom, etc.
No, regardless of any excuses that were and are made about why communism failed on so many levels, it is a failed ideology.
It doesn't work.

Therein you are equating persons with parasites; such dehumanizing attitudes are typical of apologists for capitalism.

Similarly, your contention that anyone with a little hard work or ingenuity can succeed, is spectacularly false. There are enough extenuating circumstances that prohibit success to fill a hundred books.

similarly, I am wondering as to your precise definition of 'worse for it.' It is proven that quality of life in most Eastern Bloc nations and Russia itself was better prior to the collapse of the USSR; employment was guaranteed, housing was inexpensive/free, healthcare was nationally administered, and most of the SSRs depended on the support structure of the USSR to be sustainable. They are now generally ruled by autocratic tyrants who have shifted the role of the state from providing for and extracting from the citizens, to merely extracting from the citizens.

The bottom line is the following; is money more important than people? The answer to me is no, what is your answer?

+1 to Dead Machine, although I'd be a bit more critical of the Communist engine.

That comic is amazing, frig.

First, any entity, person or otherwise, that lives off the sweat of others is a parasite. They take without contributing. What do you call them?

Second, I never said a "little" hard work; at any rate, self-sufficiency, regardless of whether it results in wealth or just standing on your own two feet, sure beats sponging off of those that actually make the effort, or the government.
Any government that is big enough to give everything to its citizenry is big enough to take it all away. And it creates nothing more than depency... are saying that being dependent on a foriegn body is godd thing?
Also, extenuating circumstances = excuses; in this country there are countless leg-up programs for those that need it, so spare me the sob routine. What, now everyone is a special little snowflake?
Not everybody deserves success, it is something that is earned, not given.

Third, I guess thats why so many people wanted out of E. Germany, as opposed to W. Germany... and of course those countries floundered after the dictatorship that controlled their lives collapsed: this is a perfect example of why communism is so flawed. If those countries were allowed to engage in free trade, i.e., be somewhat more self-reliant, they wouldn't have depended on the government providing everything for them in the first place.
And, what exactly are these so-called "autocratic tyrants" (as opposed to out and out dictators?) extracting from those countries citizenry? Taxes? Land? Sounds an awful lot like the USSR, to me.
Hmmm.
Name one country that flourished under communism.
Communism / egalitarianism, is contrary to human nature, therefore bound to failure.

Last, but not least:
So, as a future M.D., you are not going to accept the going market pay rate associated with such a position? I bet you will. And MD's do pretty good, I hear.
I get a kick in the ass when priviliged, upper middle class college kids that have benefitted vastly from the system they claim to hate go on about things like "is money more important than people"...
I don't know; are you paying your own tuition, or are your parents paying it for you? Did you get a loan? Well, if so, that has to be paid back, doesn't it? How are you going to do that? So, you tell me: what's more important? It's a loaded question, anyway. Just because one is looking out for themselves and their own doesn't mean they don't care about other people.
Again, I don't know; I was part of the under-priviliged, wrong side of the tracks set, and never had the luxury to worry about such Ivory Tower concepts as "people or money?", so get back to me in a few years, after your five-year old Benz needs to traded in for a more current model, if you can squeeze me in between rounds of golf, Doc.

I'm with cotb

Thank you.