- Capitalism and Alternatives -

Another viewpoint

Posted by: Samuel Day Fassbinder ( Citizens for Mustard Greens, USA ) on April 27, 1999 at 10:14:28:

In Reply to: communism is ideologically flawed posted by Jason on April 26, 1999 at 14:01:02:

: Communism might work in a simpler world, but here on earth it has too many flaws to work successfully. Communism seeks to establish equality among people through personal finance (or lack of it.) However, humanity is not based on money.

SDF: Marx followed your reasoning here to a T, and thus advocated the abolition of money.

: Humanity is based on love, hope, joy, achievement, and emotion.

SDF: One of the definitions of 'communism' you'll find in the dictionary is that of a society based on the community of goods, which will mean, of course, a society based on sharing. One has to imagine that for a society based on sharing to work, it must also have love, hope, joy, achievement, and emotion. Marx, from Critique of the Gotha Programme:

In a more advanced phase of communist society, where the enslaving subjugation of individuals to the division of labour, and thereby the antithesis between intellectual and physical labour, have disappeared; when labour is no longer just a means of keeping alive but has itself become a vital need; when the all-round development of individuals has also increased their productive powers and all the springs of cooperative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then can society wholly cross the narrow horizon of bourgeois right and inscribe on its banner: From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs!

: Communism inherently tends to frown upon these qualities and feelings because they have no face value to the improvement of the state.

SDF: Oh, but Marx argued for the abolition of the state as well, and one of the main reasons for the fall of Soviet "communism" was its failure to make good on that promise.

: Each human is individual and unique and the track record of communism implies that we don't like being viewed as anything less.

SDF: The track record of capitalist society is no better at producing individuality, as explained here. The question at hand is one of whether individuals can create a society based on co-operation as opposed to destruction.


Follow Ups:

None.

The Debating Room Post a Followup