Haha, funny way to say “working in the lead mines”, comrade.
Comrade, we all know lead poisoning and the need for safety gear are capitalist propaganda! Now, get back in the mines! Production must increase 50% this year, and your state-appointed union representative says it can!
Capital successfully fought to put lead into American’s blood and lungs for a century after it was known to be poison. To this day they’re still fighting to keep it there.
Textbook whataboutism
What textbook?
You’re right, America did bad thing, clearly this completely overrides the wrongs of other countries
The first commenter is talking a hypothetical scenario of socialism being bad, so the second commenter (the one you responded to) responded with actual example of that same hypothetical scenario happening, but except by a capitalist power (the US). I don’t think your response makes sense at all here.
No, his response is calling out the whataboutism fallacy. The US doing something bad does not in any way, shape, or form make socialism any less shitty. It’s poking fun at the delusional people who still think it’s a good ideology despite the overwhelming evidence.
Calling something “Whataboutism” infers a belief in American exceptionalism. You should question that belief.
No, you’re just an idiot. Whataboutism is simply a fallacy. It doesn’t infer anything outside of inconsistent logic. If you feel threatened by it then it just shows that you’re disingenuous.
Claiming Whataboutism is a logical fallacy first used by English colonizers, dont use it
He was joking, save your whataboutism for “serious” arguments
They are not joking. You can see them continuing here: https://lemm.ee/comment/3563759
And this isn’t whataboutism (not that it matters). The first commenter ridiculed socialism by using a hypothetical scenario. The second commenter showed with evidence this hypothetical scenario is actually real under capitalism.
When a liberal loses an argument they yell “whataboutism” it’s their little white flag
I think the hexbears probably fucked OP irl or something. Guy is going full mental illness mode.
To be fair, hexbears are also mentally ill
You know, it took until 2003 for Russia to remove leaded gasoline from stations. The Soviets never did it LMFAO
but nice try
EDIT: based on another commenter, OP’s claim isn’t even factual.
And it took the US until 1996 (after fall of USSR)? Not to mention that it was capitalism (General Motors) that spread the hoax about leaded gasoline being safe, under the guise of scientific research in 1921.
This is not the gotcha you think it is.
If it was all an evil capitalist conspiracy, why did the communists go along with it? Hmm?
It was not uncovered until much later that this scientific research was in fact a hoax to promote General Motors’ business.
This is very easily verified with a web search. I would be happy to guide you to specific sources and readings as well.
So, the Soviets couldn’t do their own research. Got it
Did chatgpt not include this or…?
https://bpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/sites.gatech.edu/dist/a/1473/files/2020/09/sovenv.pdf
Nevertheless, the Soviet Union took effective action to protect the population from lead exposure; it banned lead-based (white lead) paint and it banned the sale of leaded gasoline in some cities and regions. While leaded gasoline was introduced in the 1920s in the United States, it was not until the 1940s that leaded gasoline was introduced in the Soviet Union (5). In the 1950s, the Soviet Un- ion became the first country to restrict the sale of leaded gaso- line; in 1956, its sale was banned in Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev, Baku, Odessa, and tourist areas in the Caucasus and Crimea, as well as in at least one of the “closed cities” of the nuclear weap- ons complex (6, 7). The motivation for the bans on leaded gaso- line is not entirely clear, but factors may have included Soviet research on the effects of low-level lead exposure (8), or sup- port from Stalin himself (5). In any event, the bans on leaded gasoline in some areas prevented what could have been signifi- cant population lead exposure. In the United States and other OECD countries, leaded gasoline has been identified as one of the largest sources of lead exposure (9, 10). Lead-based paint is another potentially significant source of population lead exposure.
Bonus: a great example of capital at work,
Along with a number of other coun- tries, in the 1920s the Soviet Union adopted the White Lead Convention, banning the manufacture and sale of lead-based (white lead) paint (11). In the United States, however, the National Paint, Oil and Varnish Association successfully opposed the ban, and lead-based paint was not banned in the United States until 1971 (12).
Two generations of Americans.
And your point is?
Please do share an example of industrialization that somehow doesn’t include unforseen negative health effects.
Go on now, we’ll wait.
My point is that capital has successfully fought to put lead into American’s blood and lungs for over 100 years.
Name a better duo then tankies and whatsboutism
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I like how tankies conveniently forget that Marxism is just as authoritarian, just as evil, just as violent, and just as failed (in both theory and practice) as fascism. Actually, Marxism has a greater death toll than fascism. It is the ideology of scum. Tankies and neo nazis are the same level of insufferable trash.
So in other words you are unwilling to answer the question.
Got it.
This is precisely why I say that you aren’t intellectually serious people.
You have one question in your previous comment on the very first line, and it was answered.
Your statement on the 2nd line doesn’t really make sense, as I don’t think anyone blames people for unforseen negative health effects.
What people are upset about are the forseen, proven, endemic negative health effects being purposefully spread for over a century.
The gold standard are urainum mines. Lead are for those with good behavior.
Remind me, what did they do to indigenous people when they were trying to get uranium for the Manhattan project?
This nonsense is just western projection.
What is it with these commie types that they believe communism will leave everyone to become hippies who can do whatever they want and all required resources just magically arrive when they need.
It really is watching children believe in Santa Claus
If we didn’t all work to produce excess wealth for the super wealthy, we’d have 20 hour workweeks. People can do a lot with that extra time.
They I have good or bad news for you, depending on your stance. We don’t. You may, depending on the company which you work for, but generally speaking most people don’t.
Yes, yes, YES. Capitalism is evil, pitchfork and torches! Reality check: Capitalism is also the very big reason why you have a computer on your desk or in your hands in the shape of a phone to write about the evils of capitalism. Capitalism is at its core about the freedoms to share and acquire resources in the most efficient way possible. Does it have big BIG problems with runaway effects where a single person can suddenly pheewwww shoot into the sky and start resource hogging? Absolutely. Should that be legally limited and curbed? Absolutely! Is that currently done well? Absofuckinglutely not!
But none of that means that “communism will save us”. Dear god, please please don’t be THAT naive, don’t believe in santa claus.
If you want to spend your free time in a commune to help hippies or whatever it is that you want to do, I applaud you. Seriously, well done. But you WILL have to work for a home. You WILL have to work for food, and that computer you have in your hand to curse the evils of capitalism. And you have to work so that when we all do that, that resources get moved over the world so that the farmer gets his equipment that he needs to farm the grains that he sends to a supermarket that gets bought by a baker which you then buy in the shape of a bread loaf… We all work together.
Again, is there a shit tonne of abuse going on? Of course. Nobody denies that. Is that abuse being curbed? Nope. Should we hang the ultra rich that have been abusing this system? Nah, lets not hang people. I’m not for violence. But should we tax them 100% of their income until their posessions are within a reasonable range? Absolutely.
But communism is not the answer, please learn some history about the “successes” (meaning ALL failures, no exceptions) of comnunism. Read about the famines, the suppression, the torture, the corruption and the crap that comes with that to make it work. I like my freedom. I don’t need piles of cash and people generally should not be allowed to have piles. You do that with laws and taxing and enforcing. Lets focus on that instead.
Look, capitalism clearly does not work. Everything Marx and Lenin ever wrote about capitalism has come true. It is destroying our world more and more every day. Whatever you might say about communism, we do not know for a fact that it will ruin the lives of everybody, involved or not. No matter how bad you might claim communism is, it isn’t the thing that’s currently destroying our societies. So it is by definition better than capitalism.
Right? Somebody never read Animal Farm.
Sure, the current system is fucked, but it’s tied and proven that Marxism doesn’t work. We need a middle ground.
I’m sorry do you think that the point of animal farm is that the animals shouldn’t have revolted in the first place?
Ah yes, because everything you do is to meet societal needs and not to make more money for the 1%. That’s why 34% of wealth in Canada goes to the top 1%.
Then tax the crap out of them. Communism is NOT the answer, its the cause for an order of magnitude more suffering than capitalism will ever be able to cause. These sesame street types that really believe that communism will give them a vegetable garden to work in just should stop using the internet. You are using a frikkin mobile phone, a device that is the frikking epitome of capitalism and science to bitch about the evils of capitalism (and loads of people do the same with science too).
Turn in your mobile phone and go live on a hippie farm (or in a cave) and die of horrible preventable diseases, if that is what you wish, but you don’t get to have it both ways.
Yes, capitalism has a shit tonne of problems that MUST be solved, totally agree. The wealthy should be taxed up to a 100% of income once their income and net worth surpasses a certain level. Just cap it. We should have free education, free healthcare, basic rights on homes and food… A socialist system BUILT ON A CAPITALIST SYSTEM. That is because capitalism, at its core, is allowing people the freedom to trade in the most efficient way possible by themselves. THAT IS STRENGTH and that is the very reason why the west currently rules just about everything. Yes, having it run loose with no restrictions (as we currently try to do for some fucked up reason) is bad, VERY bad. Still not communism bad, though. I 100x rather have our current fucked up capitalist system over living in the fun communistic countries of the USSR (hello famines!), China (heeelllooooo famines with millions of victims!) or Korea (helloo!!!) or… Well, you get the gist. I’m not even talking about the government policing that comes with it.
Captialism has problems, absolute. FIX THEM. Don’t go jackoff over systems that are known for misery, famines, death camps, and just general failure.
Tax them how? With the government they own?
When you own the means of production it’s literally yours. I don’t understand the issue.
But you can’t own anything in socialism and communism. YOU are owned instead.
Big difference between communism and socialism.
That’s correct, but I’m not sure what you understand those terms to mean, because neither really supports taking all ownership away from people. I’m just gonna leave this blorb here, because I feel like this is where it fits best.
Communism in the style of Marx and Engels means that the workers own the means of production. They would have been completely in favor of a person owning their own farm (or jointly owning it if multiple people worked it). They didn’t really envision much of a state to interfere, much less own property.
That the Soviet Union (and later the PRC, fuck them btw) claimed to be building the worker’s paradise under communism was mostly propaganda after Lenin died. There hasn’t been any state that has implemented actual communism as established by theory.
Socialism (as I understand it, but I’m not well-read on it) means the state has social support networks, but largely works under capitalist rules, with bans of exploitative practices. There are some countries trying to implement a light version of this across Europe, to varying success (mostly failing where capitalism is left unchecked).
The issue is that the US started propagandizing like mad during the cold war, and “communism” was just catchier to say than “supportive of a country that is really just a state-owned monopoly”. Soon everything that was critical of capitalism also became “communism”, which eventually turned into a label for everything McCarthy labelled “un-american”. This is also the time they started equating the terms communism and socialism. A significant portion of the US population hasn’t moved past that yet, because it fits well into the propaganda of the US being the best country in the world, the American Dream, all that bs. The boogeyman of “the state will take away the stuff you own” turned out pretty effective in a very materialistic society. Although I’m very glad to see more and more USAians get properly educated on the matter and standing up for their rights rather than letting themselves be exploited.
Your definition of socialism is more akin to a definition of social democracy, which is… maybe a form of socialism, depending on who you ask – it is historically contentious and generally accepted that social democrats aren’t socialists.
Socialism can have all of the things that you described, but it is decidedly anti-capitalist. It reorients how workers relate to the means of production. Under capitalism, the means of production are owned by the bourgeois class, while under socialism, they are collectively owned by the workers.
Socialism means the state has social support networks, but largely works under capitalist rules
What you’re describing is “social democracy” — capitalism with safety nets, where production is still controlled by owners rather than workers. “Socialism” explicitly implies worker control of production. “Nordic socialism” could more accurately be called “Nordic social democracy.”
“Communism” refers to a classless, stateless society where everyone has what they need, no one is exploited or coerced, and there are no wars. It’s an aspirational vision for the future, not something you can do right after a revolution when capitalism still rules the world.
The issue of course is that when we reach peak communism we’ll drop possessive language entirely like in The Dispossessed.
I’ll work and teach on the farm we share.
Under communism, the state owns the resources. People are not the state.
That’s false. There’s no state in communism. See Karl Marx or any Communist writer on this.
This is a pleasant fiction.
You’ve gotta try reading beyond 6th grade level fiction before judging books on socio-economics.
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You’re mistaken, the state is a collection of proletariat meaning you are a part of the state. You may not be the whole state but it is your land as it is everyone elses
Atleast as far as I understand it
Thank you for the correction sharkfucker420
Always happy to help 👍
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Just as communism has been proven to fail in the past so is capitalism. It has been warped to something terrible for the common worker. I think this communism thing is just a way for people to vent their frustrations with the current system. Honestly as long as their is a corruptible person in charge no system will work as intended. And unfortunately everyone is corruptible.
For those interested, Dessalines’ “what would be X like under communism” is a helpful aggregated of discussions regarding this: https://dessalines.github.io/essays/socialism_faq.html#what-would-x-be-like-under-communism
Hey! Literal communist propaganda. Honestly, the better thing to do instead of this is just ask someone over 50 who lives or lived in Eastern Europe.
It’s unsurprising that many Russians look back fondly to the time when they had imperial domination over more than a dozen foreign countries, looting them for resources and using them as military puppets.
You said:
ask someone over 50 who lives or lived in Eastern Europe.
Are you backing down on that statement now or are you saying that Russia isn’t in Eastern Europe?
Russia is sometimes included in that, I wasn’t. My apologies for being unclear. Russia is the former imperial center of the Soviet Empire, so they benefited dramatically from the labor and resources of their colonies. They also never adopted the kind of modern democratic capitalism which was a competing ideology to communism during the Cold War, instead adopting a form of fascism, so I thought it was obvious to anyone that when making the comparison between capitalism and communism in Eastern Europe, a good faith participant in a discussion would look at Bulgaria, Poland, East Germany, etc.
Silly of me the think that someone who lived in Russia during the USSR would know what it’s like to live under communism
When you’re contrasting communism and capitalism, it’s strange to do it by asking someone in a fascist kleptocracy whether they miss being at the heart of a massive empire
Russia is about the only former communist nation which is worse off now, excepting perhaps Ukraine - blame Russia for that, too - and it’s because they’re Russia, not because they’re ex communists.
