I hate Capitalism just as much as i hate Socialism (Marxist Socialism and its various derivatives, to be specific).
What do you support then? Being a 'centrist' these days just means supporting Capitalism.
I am not a Marxist - his materialism and views on religion were certainly misguided. But he had a point when it came to his critique of Capitalism.
Same with Lenin.
I support what can be called 'Islamic Economics', but it's much easier to refer to it as 'Interest-free non-Materialistic Market Socialism' lest I incur the wrath of the ubiquitous Internet Secular Atheist Brigade.
Usually by "Socialism" most people imply Marxist Socialism in most cases nowadays at least anyway. The irony of it all is that the formulators of Marxism (or Communism or socialism, whichever name you prefer) were Capitalist Jews
, which explains why Marxism/socialism never worked and never will work. Though it has only worked in the mass starvation of the very workers it claims to be the savior of (that alone says a lot about the founders of such a vile ideology) .
Marx was barely a Jew. He did not identify himself as a Jew, or practice Judaism; he was an atheist. But that is irrelevant.
What do you think 'socialism', or 'marxist socialism' actually means? It simply means that whoever works gets the full value of his produce, instead of all the profits going to a small subset of the population simply because they 'own' the factory/shop/farm.
There is a massive misconception as to what Socialism actually means - most people think it means "the Government owns everything". That's really not what it means. It means the workers control the means of production. If the workers don't control the means of production, that's not Socialism.
One does not need an argument to prove Communism is a failure. It has already proven that on its own over and over again.
@Psychic @Nilgiri @The Sandman
Really? Engels' family wasn't really that wealthy and Marx had several jobs working for various newspapers - but that is completely irrelevant - what is relevant is what he actually said.
Have you ever thought
why he was considered to be a great economic thinker? Because he had a point. He had several points. His critique of Capitalism remains valid to this day. The inherent contradictions of Capitalism are very real and very tangible - that's why there's some sort of recession or depression every few years. That's why the USA has been at war for 90% of its existence.
The Soviet Union collapsed because it had turned into a State-Capitalist dictatorship. And even then, they didn't fail that badly at all.
Transforming a failing feudal state such as Tsarist Russia into a global superpower despite being invaded three times by powerful industrial nations and surviving two World Wars within a span of less than 50 years is not really a failure.
Most claims about mass starvation and the "
millions, billions, trillions" that 'evil Communism' has killed tend to be exaggerated and ignorant of history. Before the October Revolution, Russians under the Tsar suffered from extreme starvation due to poor governance and WW1 only made it worse. Russia's infrastructure, aside from a few railways, was virtually nonexistent. Most incidences of starvation that are attributed to Communism would have definitely occurred under Capitalism or any other economic system under those circumstances.
There was no starvation in the Soviet Union after 1947, after they recovered from WW2.
And let me be clear - Stalinism was not socialism, it was effectively State Capitalism; and I am no fan of the Soviet Union's expansionism and 'imperialism-lite'. That is what destroyed them.
I'd recommend the last 15 minutes of
this lecture by an actual Professor of Economics and History for a much better explanation.
Oh and this article is worth reading as a summary of Iqbal's views on Socialism and the Islamic Economics I was talking about:
http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/gk-magazine/iqbal-karl-marx-and-socialism/90927.html
Even today you have wealthy Jews like Bernie Sanders duping the dumb masses into believing their false promises whilst themselves living within the safe confines of their gated upper class communities away from all of the poverty stricken drudges of society whom they claim to be champions of.
So you'd rather have a wealthy Christian
(and Zionist) like Hillary Clinton duping the dumb masses into believing the false promises of Capitalism?
At least Bernie hasn't supported bombing a dozen countries and doesn't intend to bomb any either.
Besides, he is not a 'wealthy Jew' just because he bought a second home after being in public office for 35 years- the wealth of actual 'wealthy Jews' is well beyond that.
And Bernie is barely left, never mind a full-blown socialist. He is a centrist by global standards and his positions are considered conservative in parts of Europe - his main platform is Nationalised Healthcare and Higher Education; most European countries already have that.
The people who push this ideology don't practice it themselves. That alone is a red flag in itself.
I see what you did there with the 'red flag'
.
It is incredibly difficult to 'practice' socialism in a capitalist system. It's not some kind of religion. Many people actually do practice some of its principles; ever heard of worker co-ops? They're getting quite popular in Spain and South America. And many otherwise capitalist countries have incorporated Socialist principles - Britain and most of Europe has a National Health Service, funded by everyone, used by everyone.
