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“The United States is also a one-party state but, with typical American extravagance, they have two of them.”
I attribute the quote wrong all the time, but today the internet says it’s from Julius Nyerere, who was a prime minister in Africa back in the 1960s.
It’s the most anti-communist country on the planet, so there’s not much hope. Talk of raising wages or organizing collectively, or not agreeing with US imperialist foreign policy gets you labelled a commie / tankie by its witch-hunting, McCarthyite majority.
If there’s a list of countries to next take the communist road, the US would be dead last.
Nobody gets labeled a tankie get out of here with your projection lol.
Commie tho, all the time.
There were quite literally people throwing around the term “tankie” in this very thread.
I hope you realize Lemmy does not represent the average American…
Sure, but IRL and outside media I still hear “tankie” more than “commie,” and more importantly the original comment was made in the context of Lemmy.
You’ve heard people use the term “tankie” IRL? Damn, even the most brainpoisoned libs I know don’t do that.
Only once, and in passing, lol. The word is definitely very online
You’re telling me this statement is about Lemmy and not the US in general?
It relates to talking with USians in general, which includes interactions online, including Lemmy.
Step 1: Don’t generalize. Don’t say “Americans” when you mean “some Americans”. As you can see from browsing here and on other media sites, there are a great many vocal people who have voted Democrat for years but are entirely disappointed by decades of failed DNC leadership.
Step 2: Remind people that everyone is on their own side. Politicians might vote the way you want, or not, but their interests will never be exactly the same as yours. Don’t ever believe that the two-party system is an accurate description of our values.
Step 3: Share memes of Schumer.
Without electoral reform, there’s no functional reason to. The lesser evil of the current system is Democrats. If you want to enact change, push support for the progressive wing of the party and push for electoral reform.
Still doesn’t really solve the problem of candidates being pre-approved for the bourgeoisie.
Don’t let imperfection get in the way of progress. If you move slightly towards the left, you’re opening doors for more left ideology.
I think I’d agree with you more if I believed “pushing for XYZ” was a valid strategy for implementing structures opening the door for progress in a system dominated by those who benefit from the status quo. Without that belief, I turn to other historically succesful methods of gaining change, like millitant labor organizing and revolution.
I’ve seen a lot of similar comments lately. People wanting to start 3rd parties etc, because the Democrats suck so bad.
Yes, it’s true. They suck, but if you’re going to beat the Republicans, you’ll need to look at what Trump did. He didn’t start a 3rd party. No, he took the existing party and changed it into whatever the fuck it is now.
You need to change the democratic party from within too, because 3rd parties will always lose because of the first past the post. 3rd parties also have a tendency to branch out, because quite frankly, not being Democrat or Republican isn’t enough of a politic in itself, and you guys don’t get along well on anything else. The Republicans had this issue for a long time until Trump came along providing them with something that united their voters more than the previous politic of simply being not Democrats.
The democratic party already has a framework for running politics and they actually have some kind of democracy within that allows people to change it. Yeah, it will require a lot of work to get enough people engaged in politics to make the change, but it is absolutely much less than what is required to start a successful 3rd party.
The difference with the Republican party’s changes with Trump and the idea of performing entryism in the Democrats to make it a worker party is that Trump’s changes to the GOP are already in line with what the Bourgeoisie wants. The DNC cannot be entered and changed into a working class party because they too get their base from the bourgeoisie.
This is why revolution is necessary to gain real change in favor of the working class.
I think this is too pessimistic, especially in light of how bad all other options are for the left. Party bases change – Democrats used to be a lot closer to the working class, and (decades ago) delivered major policy improvements. With a lot of jobs re-proletarianizing, who’s to say the party base can’t shift back?
The biggest barrier to such a change is campaign donations, of course. But Bernie showed you can fund even a major presidential campaign through small donors, and we’re also at the point where corporate Dems have more money than they can effectively use (see the Harris campaign).
I haven’t really seen any evidence of this being possible. I maintain optimism, just in the revolutionary direction, not electorally.
So…if that’s your only option… when are you going to start a revolution?
When the working class is organized enough for that to happen. I suggest joining a party or organization near you so that you can assist with that, wherever you live.
I’m not American but I will promise to support you if it comes to that.
The workers unionisation in my country against land owners in the 1800s would not have succeeded without international support. I’d gladly chip in for anyone attempting to do the same.
🫡
Your title should have read “How do you destroy the notion that Republicans are the good guys?”
There are far too many Americans that support the far right. They’ve been convinced that conservatism will protect their interests, even while it blatantly destroys them. It is a morally greater objective to turn these people around, and more practically achievable, than undermining its opponent.
Yes, we know. You think liberalism is an ally of conservatism, not an opponent. We’re all very impressed with your extensive knowledge, bravo. You’ve shown nuanced and deep understanding of the political landscape by criticizing the contender of the enemy.
I think most people who criticize the left are like you. More interested in stroking their egos than actually solving a problem. You’re trying to demonstrate mastery of a subject by being critical of it, not because you want it to change but because you want people to be impressed with you.
If you actually wanted things to get better you’d be teaching people to undermine conservatism, which is the greater threat.
Be better.
Conservativism is a wing of liberalism, though. They are based in the same general underlying understanding of economics and methods of solving social problems. Right here you accuse OP of wanting to stroke their ego more than solve a problem, but I don’t believe that’s the case at all. You believing in a different solution does not mean they aren’t also trying to solve problems, this is more of a character assassination than anything else.
Conservativism cannot truly be undermined without also undermining liberalism. Leftists must organize, millitant labor organizing remains the most effective means of combatting conservativism, and is held outside the realm of liberal problem solving, usually. In my opinion, we cannot effectively combat conservativism without also addressing liberalism.
Barring whatever other insanity is in this thread, you’re left with the problem that OP is asking how to destroy democrats. If it were “how do we destroy republicans? Also I’m chill if democrats are also destroyed” that would be a different message. But the message was how do I destroy democrats.
That’s not the issue being discussed, though. In the US, there is the notion among the Working Class that just backing the Democrats harder will solve the ails of society. This isn’t true, though, the answer lies in millitant labor organizing.
Moreover, without erasing the foundations for why there’s a Republican party in the first place, you can’t truly “destroy” it. Another far-right party will continue to take its place, be that the Democrats or a new party. Asking how to destroy a party isn’t the problem, here, the problem is in moving away from using the Democrats to push for change, which historically is a strategic failure, and instead push for millitant labor organizing.
Not sure what you mean by “insanity” in this thread, either.
Seems like the issue being discussed. Or do you think that once the democrats are seen as the bad guys by everyone they will stick around?
Destroying the notion of the Democrats being the good guys is a separate concept from destroying the Democrats. The reasoning of Communists for abandoning the DNC is because it cannot and never will support the Working Class, ergo it isn’t a viable strategy.
I say again
They already are seen as bad guys by most people, yet are still around, that’s the power of FPTP.
Stop re-electing these ancient incumbents who are WAY too comfortable being Republican-lite. Vote for younger candidates, preferably someone who was born AFTER the Battle of the Bulge.
I don’t think that makes a difference. Ben Shapiro is young and is alt-right
We don’t have to do anything other then work on passing electoral reform one state at a time. Democrats can be whatever the hell they want, so long as everyone is free to vote how they want with the ability to transfer their vote.
Electoral Reform Videos
First Past The Post voting (What most states use now)
Videos on alternative electoral systems
STAR voting
Alternative vote
Ranked Choice voting
Range Voting
Single Transferable Vote
Mixed Member Proportional representation
Historically, that doesn’t actually fix systemic issues, though, like the only parties of relevance electorally being pre-approved and backed by the bourgeoisie. Moreover, electoral reform doesn’t have a real path to implementation that would make more sense than revolution to begin with.
it’s a long road with a lot more steps but simply “destroying” the notion that democrats are the good guys simply gets you republicans and that’s gotta be the worst way to shift left ever
The road is revolution, not just against the Democrats or Republicans, but the entire system.
revolution is easy to say on the internet but at the end of the day a lot of people die
People die without revolution, historically revolutionary Socialism has come with dramatic improvements in quality of life for the Working Class. Taking down the US Empire would massively uplift the burden on the Global South as well.
perhaps, or perhaps it could be replaced by something worse. there are no guarantees
Read up on historical revolution, Socialist revolution has a great track record, and if the US Empire didn’t interfere it would be even better.
economic systems don’t happen on accident
the nordic states seem to be doing pretty well at riding a good line, and whilst australia is far from socialist, what we have is working great too
accident? no of course not… but consistency… a big bang “revolution” is the easy way out… it’s so easy to say you’ll fight for what you believe in when you don’t have to see what it’ll entail or what will come out the other side of it but the reality is far more bloody and is absolutely not what you have in your head afterwards
the nordic countries do well at the cost of the third world. they are rich because of imperialism.
and you believe a revolution in the US will help the third world?
socialist countries are plenty capable of being exploitative too. a revolution doesn’t change the people - it changes the power structures
a socialist state would not spend public money so corporations can profit from waging endless war instead of just having solid healthcare.
all of the above listed counties have very solid healthcare and are not entirely socialist. what’s your point?
socialism is not a requirement for being a place that treats people with respect and dignity; nor is it a silver bullet
As @umbrella@lemmy.ml said, the Nordics can only provide the safety nets they do while paying generally high wages while still maintaining enormous profits for their bourgeoisie because they expropriate vast sums from the Global South via Imperialism, manifested in outsourcing manufacturing for pennies and through large loans. They are Landlords in country form.
They aren’t alone in this, of course, the whole of Western Europe generally does it, and the US Empire is the biggest at it.
i don’t disagree, but socialism won’t solve that just by virtue of it being different… global socialism, perhaps but on the country level it’s just not. socialism just aligns local incentives
Socialism allows it to be solved, Imperialism cannot be eliminated while Capitalism remains. Imperialism is the later stage of Capitalism.
theoretically
and now you’re arguing for massive bloodshed and forcing people to live the way you want, in potentially awful living conditions for a lot of people (i certainly, as an LGBT person, would not want to live in any previous or current socialist state) for a long time for theoretical improvement
Theoretically and practically. We have evidence for this throughout the last 130 years.
As for advocating for “bloodshed,” revolution remains the sole path to end the bloodshed, especially of the genocidal US Empire.
As for LGBTQ rights, I am pansexual myself, and I can confirm that Socialist countries make faster progress on social issues. Cuba today has much better LGBTQ rights than anywhere else in the world, and countries like the PRC are gradually improving as well. Socialism, if anything, improves the rate of progress. Even the GDR began pushing for LGBTQ rights well before Western European countries and the US did.
it sure is great that the USSR treated ukraine with respect aye… that holodomor sure is a lark
we are living in the most peaceful time in human history… a world with humans just isn’t going to be a utopia - we aren’t that good
but you’ve pulled 1 example out of many, many counter examples
There’s pretty much no evidence the USSR’s famine in the 1930s was intentional. Moreover, it was the last major famine outside of war time in a country that had regular and common famines before collectivization.
As for this being “the most peaceful time in history,” that’s wrong, and is Neoliberal propaganda. The US Empire is still propping up genocide around the world, and expropriating the fruits of the labor of the Global South.
As for 1 example out of “many counter-examples,” can you legitimately link Capitalism itself to LGBTQ rights? The USSR had better treatment of queer folk than the modern Russian Federation, one of the PRC’s most famous celebrities is openly trans, queer rights advance more quickly in countries where the working class has control. Consider reading Leslie Feinberg’s Lavender & Red | Audiobook
I would point out that the system we live in now is also maintained by violence and a lot of bloodshed, all alternatives are aggressively opposed, many people live in awful conditions already, and more often they tend to be the people on receiving end of US weapon systems. The actual death toll of capitalism is extremely high if you include social murder and neglect too.
it is a requirement if you want to do that without oppressing brown people elsewhere.
the important thing is not socialism: it’s a government that deals with negative externalities
socialism tends to do better at that simply because often it often does better at long-term planning (but that’s not a given either), but capitalism without corporate bullshit, stock markets, etc (ie actual ownership over a business rather than just ownership over a vague thing where you’re only concerned with line goes up not long term business health) has pretty much the same drivers: long term sustainability and this holding others to account for their negative externalities
What you describe as “corporate bullshit” and “stock markets” are just a symptom of later stages of Capitalism. You cannot maintain the small stages forever, eventually they will coalesce into large firms and syndicates. You can’t simply bust up monopoly either, manufacturing gets so complex that it needs to be done by large companies to handle the scale.
This process doesn’t stop, though, it becomes better and more efficient to publicly own and plan these large firms as they get larger and larger. This is why Socialism is a necessity regardless.
i don’t disagree of course, and i wasn’t saying capitalism is the only way; i think capitalism like this is absolute trash as well… i’m simply saying that those qualities are neither intrinsic to, nor exclusively found in socialist systems
perhaps, but honestly i don’t think we’ve actually even tried. we jumped straight from feudalism to some form of capitalism to some socialism. we’ve never had a system that tried to keep things small - and i’m not saying we should either necessarily
but these arguments are all reasonably theoretical
socialism is perhaps part of a solution but dealing in absolutes is rarely ever correct
Corporate bullshit and stock markets and whatnot are magnified in impact and scale in Capitalist systems, surely that’s relevant?
As for “trying to keep things small,” that’s been tried. Trust busting was attempted, protectionism has been attempted, but regardless of will, material processes continue.
As for Socialism being a necessity, it’s true. It will have various forms, but eventually as production gains in complexity it necessitates public ownership and planning to continue to be efficient.
and authoritarian tendencies are magnified in impact and scale in socialist systems because they are by definition centralised - that’s not to say it’s inevitable, just that anyone living under these systems needs to be hyper aware of those issues and respond accordingly
nothing is perfect
i think the closest we have to that is the EU with things like the DMA which is making a dent… with strong regulatory authority that’s resistant to capture, it’s not impossible to regulate these things… the same is true of socialism: you need strong regulatory authorities that are resistant to capture to stop people from abusing the system for the own personal interests
i think perhaps we should define what we actually mean - i think socialism is necessary in some part to tackle the issues we face (healthcare, housing, something akin to UBI, etc)
but i think no single system is going to be the silver bullet to all our problems: it’s going to take a long and sustained effort over many generations to figure out the right mix of all the systems we have, and it’s absolutely not going to happen in a big bang
I don’t know what you mean by “authoritarian tendencies,” AES states are generally more democratic for the working class than Capitalist states. I think you’re just accepting the tyranny of the bourgeoisie as outside the realm of democracy, when political economy is interlinked.
As for the EU, it’s in decay and relies on Imperialism, it isn’t a sustainable model and they are thoroughly vassalized by the US Empire.
As for Socialism, I don’t mean Social programs. I mean moving from an economic model where Private Property is dominant to one where Public Property is dominant. You’re right, this will be a long process, but it will be through such a model based on Public Owneship. Look to the PRC to see the kind of long, drawn-out process this is in action.
The Deprogram podcast, Hakim, and Second Thought YT channels all exist to address this. It’s rather obvious to anybody willing to learn
Crypto tankies lol
USSR dindu muffin mate
Complaining about Marxist-Leninists on a platform made by MLs and the instance maintained by them is a bit silly. There’s nothing “crypto” about support for Communism on Lemmy.
Moreover, I find that the ones most critical of the USSR, as in the ones best looking at what honestly and truthfully went wrong with the Soviet Union, are MLs. It’s easy to regurgitate “100 gorillion dead no iphone vuvuzela,” but that isn’t particularly critical as it isn’t based in reality, just non-sequitors and gotchas.
Meanwhile, MLs can usually talk in depth about the issues with Gorbachev, Yeltsin, and even Kruschev’s reforms, or the struggles with planning by hand in a computerized era, discussion on whether or not the NEP should have been modified, extended, or eliminated even earlier or right on time, and more. This is because MLs want to use the Soviet Union as an example, learn from the good and learn from the bad so we can more effectively build a Socialist future.
Do you ever wonder why but a small minority of eastern Europeans hate USSR and Russia?!
Or why Ukraine is fighting its war?
tankie ignores the lived experience of people subjected to the Russian rule including communism area because america bad
Clown world
Most ex-Soviets regret the collapse of the USSR, actually. This is well-documented.
The article seems to be missing polling history from countries that don’t support it’s thesis, like Poland.
No idea what you mean by a “thesis,” but countries like Estonia are included. I am unsure if polling has been done in Poland regarding this, but even if everyone in Poland prefered Capitalism it would still be true that the majority of ex-Soviet citizens prefer Socialism.
That’s not exactly what the polls in the article were about though?
Not sure how to take the idea that dissolving Socialism and replacing it with Capitalism was harmful other than a preference that Socialism be maintained.
My point is that the polls mentioned in the wiki seem to not be mentioning socio-economic systems, but the USSR country and it’s culture, as well as it’s dissolution (which was handled like shit in most of the countries AFAIK).
Kinda? Hard to disentangle that from the economic structures that changed.
Anybody using the word ‘tankie’ can be safety blocked and ignored.
If they haven’t accepted it yet, I’m not sure they want to. The ones holding the lines seem to be just reactionaries pining for a return to the neoliberal status quo.
DUPOLOY
they’re not good guys they are simply more competent at government