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PeepinGoodArgs ,

Yeah.

Sanctus ,
@Sanctus@lemmy.world avatar

I really dont see any Romans pressuring me around here.

Grayox OP ,
@Grayox@lemmy.ml avatar

Rome didn't have aircraft carriers and tactical nukes.

Sanctus ,
@Sanctus@lemmy.world avatar

Rome lasted long enough to find its own ancient artifacts.

snooggums ,
@snooggums@midwest.social avatar

Gestures half heartedly at all the Roman inspired government buildings.

theneverfox ,

Gestures at the 1%, who are overwhelmingly descendants of the aristocracy created by Rome and managed by the holy Roman empire

TheAlbatross ,

Casual club conversation

Deestan ,

As a european it's always been fucking WERID how americans panic and reach for their guns at the mention of socialism.

AdmiralShat ,

I mean

There was this whole thing called the Soviet Union then there was like a missile crisis

And there was like a group that called themselves National Socialists and they did a genocide and tried to take over a bunch of land by force

We also had to fight a bunch of talking trees that dug tunnels because military industrial complex and heroin

It's definitely many layers of propaganda but as an American I definitely understand WHERE it comes from, I understand why most people here flinch at the word.

You also gotta understand we had multiple generations in a row huffing lead gasoline so while younger millennials aren't impacted as bad, MOST Americans are legitimately lead brained.

Got_Bent ,

It wasn't just leaded gasoline. I was busy getting hot boxed with cigarettes in my grandparent's leaded gasoline car before burning some asbestos, plastic cutlery, and batteries in the living room fireplace.

Forget no seatbelts or bicycle helmets. Our chemical exposure would probably send a younger person without a built up tolerance into instant seizure.

I also remember crimping down lead shot sinkers on my fishing line with my teeth. Good times. Good times indeed.

azertyfun ,

Bruh

The Nazis were literally IN Europe. The USSR literally built a WALL here splitting the continent. And you're saying that explains why America is the one with socialism PTSD???

Ain't nothing more American than making everything about you I guess.

AdmiralShat ,

I guess you can't fucking read lol, the comment I'm replying to was TALKING ABOUT AMERICANS. I didn't make it about Americans the fucking European did.

Holy shit dude how did you fuck that up so bad

azertyfun ,

But European don't panic at the mention of socialism (what the comment you're replying to was talking about) yet the Europeans have suffered FAR MORE from your examples of "socialism" than Americans. You can't explain away how American politics differ from European politics by appropriating European tragedies.

AdmiralShat , (edited )

You are so shoved up your own ass it's insane. Firstly, really bad reading skills. I never justified the response, just that I understand the origins. For fucks sake use your brain a little before attacking someone and sounding like a dunce for it.

azertyfun ,

But it DOES NOT explain the origins. The USSR and the Nazis are not CAUSES. They CAN'T BE because otherwise Europe would never integrated elements of socialism!

I think we actually agree on that, it's just semantics at this point. Whatever.

Also watch your aggressiveness. I didn't call you names and I expect the same in return.

AdmiralShat ,

It's not even semantics if you're actively misunderstanding the definitions of words, but okay illiterate.

Don't tell someone to watch their aggressiveness AFTER you started being a cunt. I expect you not to be a cunt to begin with, so why am I beholden to YOUR levels of response? Ridiculous to assume you set the bar when you already fucked right on past it to begin with.

The fucking ego on this guy, ffs

Also, "it can't be the right answer because a different place with different culture did a different thing!". Seriously? Did I not explain the lead brain and the propaganda? Or did you not read that? Oh wait, borderline illiterate yeah. Like I'm not justifying the response IM EXPLAINING THE ORIGIN OF IT.

If you can't follow along then stop replying altogether here

TacoButtPlug ,
@TacoButtPlug@sh.itjust.works avatar

It's the boomers who do this primarily. I guess they were spoon fed this shit as babies.

scrubbles ,
@scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech avatar

As an American I wish it was easier to pack up and move to Europe :(

Sprucie ,

This is a genuine question from a European, what does make it difficult to move here?

SimpleMachine ,

Maybe I just suck at the research, but from what I can tell getting a permanent residence visa is not easy for Americans. If I'm wrong I would absolutely love to know.

frezik ,

France seems to be relatively easy to gain permanent residence and even citizenship, but they do expect you to learn fluent French. Most of the EU requires birthright citizenship. A few will grant it to the decedents of immigrants, like Ireland, though they only do it for two generations out.

Efwis ,

Money for the most part for a lot of people.

Passports are $400+ USD, then there are the plane tickets, which are hundreds of dollars. Then to top it off you need to have room and board while looking for a job and someplace to live.

Another thing I’ve heard is fear of leaving the known and family.

BreadOven ,

Do Americans not usually have passports? I just assumed most people had one (I'm not American though).

Efwis ,

Pretty much the only time we need passports is if we travel outside the U.S. and territories. Those that take cruises or cross borders to other countries would, but generally speaking a majority of Americans don’t have passports.

jollyrogue ,

No. Most don’t leave the US, so there isn’t a need. Plus, until recently, Canada and Mexico only needed an ID card like a drivers license.

scrubbles ,
@scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech avatar

Eh for me it's a lot of things. For one just roots, family and friends. Then next is work, I'd have to find a new job over there (doubtful my current one would let me work abroad), and I'd need to see if visas would let me work over there, and for how long. I would probably make less over there, but cost of living is lower too, so I'd have to do finances. Most countries don't let you own property unless you're a citizen, and I wouldn't be, so I'd have to rent for a while. Path to citizenship would then be difficult, and I would have to pay taxes for both countries. Then just pure logistics of what do I do with everything here, would have to basically start all over. It'd be much easier if I was in my early 20s, but I'm nearing 40 which makes it much more difficult.

jollyrogue ,

Money mostly.

There is usually something like needing $250K in the bank to be considered for permanent residency. Then the paperwork costs money, so most Americans will have to wait until they get refugee status.

DrWeevilJammer ,
@DrWeevilJammer@lemmy.ml avatar

Several things keep Americans from moving to Europe.

First, immigration laws of the country one is moving to. If one is not able to get a passport from an EU or EEA county based on ancestry, you basically need to be sponsored for a work visa by a company in the country you want to move to, which can be quite difficult. And even then, you have to be employed in that country for long enough to qualify for permanent residency, then citizenship, which can take up to 7 or 8 years in some countries.

If one is lucky enough to have parents or grandparents who emigrated to the US from a European country and can claim citizenship based on that, it's a lot of work to get all of the paperwork together and verified and accepted by that government's consulate (at least it is for Germany, but German bureaucracy is ... special).

Second, the US is one of the only countries in the world that double taxes its citizens. If someone was born in the United States, they will have to file taxes reporting income to the US government every single year until they die, and PAY taxes to the US government on any income over a certain amount every year until they die, regardless of the source of that income, and regardless of the fact that taxes on the same income need to be paid to the host country.

While I have zero respect for the snivelling shitgibbon name Boris Johnson, he was born in New York and had to renounce his US citizenship to escape the IRS. You also have to PAY the US government $2350 (in cash) for the privilege of giving up your citizenship, which is also...unique.

Sometimes there are tax treaties that can take most of the sting out of the double taxation issue (Norway's is decent for US citizens), but it depends on the country.

Finally, it just never occurs to many Americans that leaving is even a possibility.

whogivesashit ,

We're all poor af

Got_Bent ,

In all fairness, we panic and reach for our guns at the mention of just about anything. Right this very moment, I'm pooping on company time, scared out of my wits, a nine millimeter at the ready atop my presently ankle adorning boxers.

Blackmist ,

WAS THAT THE DOORBELL!!!

rickdg ,
@rickdg@lemmy.world avatar

Any criticism of capitalism is the same as historical communism and therefore always wrong. Accept your fate, citizen.

explodicle ,

That's just historical capitalism. I can fix him!

davel ,
@davel@lemmy.ml avatar

Real capitalism has never been tried!

merc ,

Real capitalism would require:

  • Flameout Professional Fire Services (i.e. no publicly funded fire department)
  • Johnny's Good Eats Certification (i.e. no FDA testing to keep food safe)
  • SuperStonk Seal of Approval (i.e. no SEC regulating private companies, just for-profit companies doing that job)
  • Rodney's Roads and Trails (i.e. all roads are private, you need a payment plan to use them)
  • Policing by Pinkertons (i.e. all policing is private and for-profit)
  • Job Insurance, LLC (you pay for private job insurance when you have a job, you hope for benefits if you lose it)
  • 401(k), or starve (you didn't contribute to your 401(k), that's too bad)
  • Only private health insurance, no medicare, no medicaid, no Obamacare, no CHIPs, etc.

You could still have a military, but injured soldiers would be treated by private MASH units, soldiers would be fed by Taco Bell (paid for out of pocket), on base housing would be contracted out to AirBnB, aircraft maintenance would be contracted out to Boeing, and of course Veteran's Affairs wouldn't exist.

davel ,
@davel@lemmy.ml avatar

Basically the fascist Chile of the Chicago Boys’ and Pinochet’s wet dreams.

merc ,

Except, even there, it was only a dream. Fascism may have elements of capitalism, but fundamentally if the leader is above the law, then private individuals don't own the means of production, it's only the leader who truly owns everything, and so it's not really capitalism.

cosmicrookie ,
@cosmicrookie@lemmy.world avatar

European here.

This seems to mainly only be an issue in the US. Socialism = Communism = Enemy

If at all anything, the opposite seems to be the case here. We're looking at the US as a "this is how bad it will get if we let go" example

wintermute_oregon ,

Europe uses the word socialism differently. It’s a difference in how the words are used and the time they are used.
If we consider socialism shared responsibility, we have it America in many ways but we are hesitant to expand it. That’s because of our fear of large government power.

If we me socialism as the workers owning the means of production. Well no country does that. Normally it’s the government owning everything and the workers being abused such as the Soviet Union or Cuba. That’s the large governments Americans dislike.

Valmond ,

Yeah, socialism isn't taxing the rich, it is or at least have always led to brutal dictatorships because the real one is just communism with extra steps.

Social-democracy on the other hand is wonder for the people (see Sweden etc) in real life.

wintermute_oregon ,

I’m a conservative and read a wonderful article on why conservatives should be leading the charge to a social democracy like Sweden.
It really changed my views on why we should be skippering certain endeavors. Just neither party here has really embraced the basic concept.

An example was national health care allowed people to be more entrepreneurial since that is a large risk to not have insurance here.

Valmond ,

That's not being conservative my man.

wintermute_oregon ,

Then you don’t understand conservatism.

NewPerspective ,

🍿

Valmond ,

That's not being conservative my man.

ComradePorkRoll ,

Yeah y'all really don't want to end up like us. We're not the land of the free. The streets are most definitely not paved with gold. We're just a giant ponzi scheme.

Krauerking ,

It's actually insane how many of our institutions are actually based on pyramid schemes. No wonder we all use it as the symbol for conspiracy because it is a huge portion of how anything runs in the US. Cover the costs by convincing more people to join in at a less beneficial or profitable step down the pyramid and hope someone else will be coming behind you for you to take from as well.

Ookami38 ,

Paved with gold? Lucky they're paved at all this time of year.

bobs_monkey ,

No kidding. Their "fix" every year is to either fill all the potholes with asphalt, which the spring rains promptly loosen and get kicked out, or a thin "repaving" layer, which gets destroyed by the summer monsoons. I'm convinced Caltrans is a jobs program for people that can't get a job otherwise, because those guys can't seem to get anything done correctly.

scrubbles ,
@scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech avatar

I have a pothole literally 2 feet wide and at least 10 inches deep on my street that our city just can't find the funds to fix...

Saurok ,

Start a social media account for pics of the pothole. Keep tagging city officials in it. Call or email someone every time you're reminded that the pothole exists so they will be too. Make the city rue the day they gave Cave Johnson lem... Potholes.

whotookkarl ,
@whotookkarl@lemmy.world avatar

If they won't do it some helpful citizen might end up reading something like https://www.wikihow.com/Fix-a-Pothole

someguy3 , (edited )

In addition: government programs that help everyone = helping black people = no.

I think this is the fundamental reason why the US never went to public/universal anything, be it healthcare, education, whatever.

AngryCommieKender ,

Yep. We should have told the colonies of Georgia and Carolina to fuck off, and we'll get around to conquering them, after we kicked The King out of the other 11 colonies.

If one person had voted differently during The Continental Congress, we would have started abolishing slavery

someguy3 ,

Fascinating history.

volvoxvsmarla ,

the opposite seems to be the case here

Cries in Lindner

foggy ,

Socialism = Communism = Enemy*

*Unless Russia 🤑

cosmicrookie ,
@cosmicrookie@lemmy.world avatar

I think you missed the point

Revan343 ,

Russia isn't socialist anymore. It's a fascist capitalist hellscape, which is why Republicans like it

Cowbee ,

The USSR collapsed several decades ago. Russia now is fascist, over a Capitalist economy.

merc ,

There are elements of capitalism there, but I wouldn't call it a capitalist economy. Capitalism requires that private individuals own the means of production. But, in Russia does anybody outside Putin's inner circle really own anything?

Cowbee ,

Yes, absolutely. The Russian Federation is the direct result of a collapsing Socialist system in the hands of Capitalists, just because fewer and fewer people own things doesn't mean it isn't a direct result of Capitalization of the economy.

merc ,

The USSR wasn't really socialist at its core, and the new Russia really isn't capitalist at its core.

In the former system, the theory was that the people / workers owned the means of production. The reality was that it was the leader and those close to him who really "owned" them in the sense that they had power over them. It was all about who you knew in that system. In a true socialist system, it should have been up to the people to make decisions, but in the USSR it was up to the party's elites, and the people just had to live with it.

In the current system, it's Putin and his close circle who own everything. While they allow capitalist type activities to happen, the capitalists don't really own anything. If they displease Putin anything they have can be taken away on a whim. If you stay on Putin's good side, or at least stay beneath his notice, you can operate as a capitalist. But, become too successful and you'll be reminded who's in charge.

Both true socialism and true capitalism require that the rule of law apply to everyone, even the leaders. If the leader can just ignore the laws and seize the "means of production" without facing consequences, it's authoritarianism, not capitalism or communism / socialism.

Cowbee ,

The USSR was a flawed form of Socialism, but was fundamentally Socialist. The majority of the economy was run by Worker Soviets, in a process called Soviet Democracy. The Politburo, ie the highest Soviet, had a massive amount of influence and power, but day to day decisions were made locally. I would agree, I don't think it was a particularly good form of Socialism, but I would still consider it Socialist.

Modern Russia is absolutely Capitalist at its core, that's the entire foundation of the Russian Federation. The Capitalists are the Oligarchs! The Inner Circle are Capitalists! just because it's a higher stage of Capitalism doesn't mean it ceases to be Capitalism.

merc ,

The USSR was a flawed form of Socialism, but was fundamentally Socialist

Was the rule of law strong enough that decisions were being made by the people, or were they being made by authoritarians? Because if key decisions weren't being made by the people, it wasn't socialist.

The Capitalists are the Oligarchs!

The Oligarchs are feudalists, not capitalists.

Cowbee ,

Yes, it actually was. The Politburo had outsized power, but the local Soviets ran most things. Again, incredibly flawed, but still Socialist.

Oligarchs are not land owners that take a portion of what food is grown by the Russian people, the Oligarchs are Capitalists.

merc ,

Oligarchs are not land owners

Oligarchs control the exploitation of Russia's natural resources. Can't get much more "land owner" than that.

Cowbee ,

Capitalists can do that as well, without being feudalists. You're tying an ancient peasant-aristocrat structure to modern Capitalism just to avoid acknowledging that Capitalism has failed Russia.

merc ,

You're trying to pretend that an oligarchy / dictatorship has something to do with capitalism because you hate capitalism.

Cowbee ,

On the contrary, I'm acknowledging that Capitalist business owners have swelled and looted Russia very effectively.

merc ,

Except it has nothing to do with capitalism.

Cowbee ,

It has everything to do with Capitalism. When the USSR collapsed and the Russian Federation came into place, Capitalists got much of the Capital, and are now the "oligarchs."

Revan343 ,

just because fewer and fewer people own things doesn't mean it isn't a direct result of Capitalization of the economy

In fact that's the natural progression of a Capitalist economy

bouh ,

Well, French president and several of its ministers are saying that socialist left, or radical left, is extremist. So no, it's not an America problem. It's very much a Europe problem too.

Honytawk ,

No, because the majority of people do not live in the US.

So the amount of influence is the same from the US and Russia and China.

We aren't as uninformed as this meme suggests about the concept. We know it has positives, but we also know the negatives, of which there are many.

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

...i am confident you don't know shit. I say this with respect, tho it doesn't sound respectful.

Because the way you replied to the barest possibility that you are ignorant or misled is to post "no i'm not" instead of being curious and searching for what you might have missed. If you're not curious, and you don't consider yourself propagandized you are exactly this meme, whererever you may be from.

Cowbee ,

What negatives? Do people turn evil, or do tools stop working, if tools are owned by a collective?

the_post_of_tom_joad ,

Yes. You see, if most of the profits aren't taken from all the people making them and given to like, just a few people to keep for themselves, we'd have mass hysteria!

I shudder to think of what the workers might get up to if they had more of the money they created, or more of a voice in their workplace. They might start doing dangerous things that benefitted themselves instead of the stonks, and that idea is just disgusting to me

neptune ,

Remember when Barbie didn't end with Will Farrells head in the guillotine?

someguy3 , (edited )

Ugh you just reminded me of one of the right's comic strips where women put men's balls in a guillotine with "the left wants to do this" idea.

LoamImprovement ,

I mean, I think Mattel probably would have hard vetoed that. I'm honestly shocked they got the fascist line in.

davel ,
@davel@lemmy.ml avatar
someguy3 ,

Oh time for my link

Frame Canada

Wendell Potter spent decades scaring Americans. About Canada. He worked for the health insurance industry, and he knew that if Americans understood Canadian-style health care, they might.... like it. So he helped deploy an industry playbook for protecting the health insurance agency.

https://www.npr.org/2020/10/19/925354134/frame-canada

TacoButtPlug ,
@TacoButtPlug@sh.itjust.works avatar

I want to kick the dude in the face

UsernameHere ,

Not from “the west” from “the rich”. There are rich people in every type of economy that use their money to gain more power. One of the many ways that is done is with propaganda to convince those with less that the rich in power are not the problem.

Just look at the oligarchs in Russia.

Cowbee ,

Not every economic system, economic systems that place significant barriers against ballooning of individual wealth off exploitation see less disparity, and thus less of an impact of money on politics. Beaurocracy becomes a new kind of power currency, which is why much of the Politburo in the USSR was corrupt, though its worth noting that their disparity levels were lower than currently in the Russian Federation.

The Russian Federation's "Oligarchs" are a spooky word for Capitalists that dodges the fact that they are Capitalists that took advantage of the collapse of the USSR to gain massive outsized power and wealth. The Russian Federation is Capitalist, not Socialist.

UsernameHere ,

Not every economic system, economic systems that place significant barriers against ballooning of individual wealth off exploitation see less disparity, and thus less of an impact of money on politics.

You say not every economic system, but then you say less disparity, less impact.

Less disparity means there is still disparity. Less impact means there is still impact.

Because like I said, as long as there are human beings who want more power, there will be a struggle in any economic systems to prevent disparity.

That is because it isn’t the economic system that deregulates or undermines protections.

It is those who seek more power who deregulate and undermine protections.

And those people exist in all types of economic systems.

Even capitalist America had a point in history where disparity was low and the middle class and lower class thrived.

That is no longer the case because of those who removed regulations and changed the laws to suite themselves. And again, those people exist in every type of economy.

Cowbee ,

I did not say you could not eliminate the influence of money on politics, did I? You did. I countered it, and now you're implying that it's impossible to completely get rid of.

You can account for bad actors and power-seekers woth egalitarian distribution of power and a prevention against gaining in power.

UsernameHere ,

You can account for bad actors and power-seekers woth egalitarian distribution of power and a prevention against gaining in power.

How? Without stating how this is accomplished, you’re response is only really saying,

‘you can account for bad actors and power-seekers by living in a perfect world where bad people don’t exist’

If there were an economic system that achieved that it would be a utopia. I don’t know of any utopias on earth.

Cowbee ,

Equal ownership of the Means of Production. Socialism.

UsernameHere ,

There are still hierarchies in socialist economies. Thats why there is still disparity in socialist economies.

Do you have an example of one of these socialist societies where everyone has equal power?

Cowbee ,

What hierarchy? Statist hierarchy? That's why the goal of Socialism is Communism, and nobody has reached Communism yet. Do you think we live at the end of history?

UsernameHere ,

Goals are nice. But we are talking about how to achieve an economic system that actually achieves this. Not just sets goals to.

You are claiming Communism and Socialism can do it but when I ask for an example you say they just haven’t done it yet.

If they have existed for centuries but haven’t achieved their goals yet what makes you think they can?

Cowbee ,

I think it can be achieved because it's based in logical progression of real systems. If I can take your exact same argument and use it against Capitalism in pre-revolution France, with a similar lack of logical foundation, I don't think your argument holds any water. It's more like a strainer than a bowl.

UsernameHere ,

If it just needs to be “based in logical progression of real systems” to achieve the goal, then why has it not succeeded yet after centuries of existence?

If I can take your exact same argument and use it against Capitalism in pre-revolution France

My argument that disparity is caused by people pursuing power and not economic systems?

Please explain how your example of France proves my argument wrong.

Cowbee ,

Because history occurs over time, not instantly.

Here's perhaps the funniest use of your own terrible argument: you believe that humans cannot land on Mars, because it hasn't happened yet, at least if you're at all logically consistent. You also believe the iPhone 20 will never exist, of course.

See why your argument that "if this is what happens over time, why hasn't it happened now?" is horrible? You make no actual analysis, in fact, you run from analysis.

Please make an actual point.

UsernameHere ,

Just because something hasn’t happened yet doesn’t mean it is guaranteed to happen in the future.

I didn’t think that I needed to explain that to you. I was wrong. Sorry.

I am not saying things can’t happen if they haven’t happened yet.

I am saying if Socialism and Communism have existed for centuries and that whole time they have had disparity. What reason is there to believe that disparity cannot exist in socialist or communist economies?

Cowbee ,

I didn't say it was guaranteed, I just said it's possible.

Communism has not existed for centuries, except in concept. It has never been achieved.

Do you even know what we are talking about?

UsernameHere ,

Yes, I am talking about why you think Communism is the solution to inequality but it just hasn’t achieved it yet after centuries of existing.

Then you moved the goalpost to claim that communism has never been achieved.

So let’s talk about that now.

Why do you think Communism has never been achieved but at the same time think it is capable of solving inequality?

Cowbee ,

I didn't move the goalpost, Communism as a concept is a Stateless, Classless, Moneyless society that can be achieved after Socialism has built the groundwork for it. It hasn't been achieved yet, because there have been no developed Socialist states yet, and Communism is a global, international system. It takes a long time to get there, it isn't just something that poofs into existence.

UsernameHere ,

So Communism is:

concept

classless

moneyless

stateless

achieved by Socialist states

takes a long time

never been achieved before

I wonder why it hasn’t been achieved before.

Cowbee ,

It's a Stateless, Classless, moneyless society. It's hard to build, but it's possible to build towards, and will take time and development to get there.

UsernameHere ,

Godspeed.

MystikIncarnate , (edited )

Canadian here: socialism has been a part of culture since the outset. Even Americans have social systems in place to support the population. Many don't recognize it as such, but it's there.

One of the many outstanding examples of this is fire fighting. Everyone just assumes that the fire department is there and normal, but it's socialist. In the early days, fire departments were more privatized and several may show up at a blaze to basically quote the property owner to put out the blaze. This was widely inefficient at a time when spending more time to discuss the business of firefighting would take away precious minutes from the job of firefighting and it would put lives and property at risk for every minute the start of firefighting activities were delayed.

It was pretty much unanimously acknowledged that putting out a fire is more important than figuring out who is going to pay for it, or do the job; so social infrastructure was made common for fire fighting. Given that it would risk not only the structure and lives of those involved in the blaze but also that of the surrounding structures and the lives of those who lived/worked in those structures, is obvious why government/social fire departments exist. They are there to save the life and limb of those involved in a blaze and do their best to prevent as much property damage as possible from such an event.

Its very nature is socialist, by the people, for the good of the people, paid for by the people. This is, however, still more or less unanimously agreed upon as a necessary thing.

Canada has extended this to healthcare, since during an emergency, like a life threatening wound or condition (cardiac issues are a common one to cite), time is essential. Going to an "in network" hospital, like the Americans may need to do, could add minutes or even hours of travel time between getting to the patient and getting them to the care that they desperately need. That time could mean the difference between living through it, and dying on route. So we have socialized healthcare too, no matter where I am in Canada, or what the closest hospital is or who administrates it, I can get the help I need immediately, at no cost to me. This saves lives, but it mainly saves the lives of people who would otherwise not be able to afford healthcare, or to have a healthcare package that allows for any hospital to provide care. This has been extended, in Canada, to cover more than just emergency situations. So pretty much all my basic care is covered.

This is socialist and one of the things that America seems to be very strongly opposed to. This leads me to believe that the fire department situation is less about saving lives and more about saving property. To put it crudely: "I don't want my (thing) to be damaged by the fire happening with your (thing)." (Kind of mentality).... At least on the part of regulators. They're okay with fire departments since fire can spread and create a bigger problem, including a problem for those who control the government. Meanwhile with healthcare, the problem is your problem and they don't want any part of paying for your ability to resolve it. In this assertion: property > lives.

Most liberal/left/communal focused people (myself included) are more focused on the greater good for all, not just for you, or your loved ones. We want what's best for the majority of everyone. The people on the right are usually very capitalist and focused on what benefit do I get? above all else. They get no immediate benefit if you're in good health or survive a major medical issue. There are long term benefits from having a healthy, educated public, but it's all long term thinking that seems to escape most capitalists. "Why pay for something now hoping for a benefit later?"

Additionally, the benefits are a paradox, that you'll certainly get the benefit, but usually in the lack of long term costs, so the benefit is forged in the form of not losing money in the future, which, quantifying a lack of losses that didn't happen is nearly impossible. This was recently demonstrated in the analogy of rat poison, which some of you may be familiar with: "why do we have all this rat poison around? I haven't seen a rat in years! Stop putting out rat poison, it costs us money and serves no benefit" then later: "where did all these rats come from?"

You continue to pay for and cover people for their safety and security, and you don't have to deal with replacing them. You don't suffer those negative effects of not having their help, and that's a hard thing to prove when it didn't happen.

Capitalists, from my experience, lack this kind of theoretical thinking, only benefiting from the experience of making a bad decision to remove the rat poison, only to have their entire company overrun by rats causing a more significant loss than if they had simply continued to pay for the placement of the poison. That experience and thinking is dangerous when it comes to policy, as many people need to die before the losses are realized.

The recent loss of a large portion of the population due to this same short term thinking during COVID, is going to have ripple effects on the job market for decades. People who would otherwise be alive, well, and ready to work, are either suffering with life long illness, or a serious case of death, and it creates a worker shortage.

Workers who were happy to keep their jobs at a minimal pay increase are now being replaced by people who are demanding better conditions and pay. Which only serves to emphasize the struggle between companies and their employees. That struggle has been ongoing for decades or more.

I've seen rather poor job postings for my line of work, go unanswered for weeks because the company is offering too little for too much work, and have a reputation for overworking their employees. An extreme example of this is from Amazon. They're facing a shortage of people who are willing to cope with their insane working conditions. They're burning through the workforce at an unprecedented rate by demanding too much and providing too little. Their own internal analytics have identified this as a problem, and they're not doing enough, quickly enough, to curtail it so they don't end up with nobody who is willing to put up with their shit for what they're paying (specifically referring to warehouse and delivery workers here).

It's an ongoing problem and it's borne from the extreme capitalist way of doing things: burning through willing workers until none remain, all in the pursuit of profits in the short term.

The only way that Amazon has curbed the issue is in contracting out their delivery system, bringing on dedicated delivery contractors, and professional delivery companies like FedEx and UPS (or similar) who can "pick up the slack" for not being able to hire enough drivers to fulfill their orders.

Amazon is a good case study on capitalist business practices and the values of capitalists. But I digress.

Social services, and social/socialist philosophies will always be better at/for long term planning, while capitalist systems will be better in the short term. The two will always butt heads on what's important because they focus on wildly different things. Many capitalist Americans bring this business philosophy home with them; they don't, and will never support something that doesn't have a clear and direct benefit to them, and will continue to advocate for personal responsibility of anything that doesn't and cannot affect them directly, believing that doing otherwise will unreasonably increase the costs of the systems they use for those benefits and unreasonably benefit those they see as competition on their imaginary "ladder of success", which will, to them, unreasonably and unjustly elevate those who have not earned it, to a better position on the success ladder, which may, as a side effect, cause their position to become weaker as a result. They're better than those who can't afford what they have, and they'll fight with every tool they have to ensure that those whom are less than them, know that they are less. That may be in the form of denying them healthcare that they need but cannot afford, or wages that they cannot otherwise earn because of either job scarcity (or simply the scarcity of jobs offering more), or that they don't have the education to earn such a position.

They're "better" than others. Those that want stuff that doesn't benefit them are idiots and their "lessers", and should be "put on their place" to them.

This is, at its heart, thinly veiled classism, driven into the masses by propaganda, and reinforced by the ruling class, aka celebrities, the affluent, and government officials. The "Elite" class has convinced their lessers to fight the fight for them.

IMO, the only way to break someone of this thinking is to attack the root cause of the thoughts, that you're not better than your neighbors and the people you would consider to be less than you are. That we're actually all part of the "masses" and we, as the "masses" are in a sustained and ongoing fight with those that consider all of us to be their lessers, aka, the "elites". Only when they recognize that we're not fighting eachother or vying for some imaginary "rank" in an objectively unfair system, will they ever understand that social services are not only good for everyone, but a requirement for everyone. We all will have slightly more or slightly less than everyone else, and those slight differences are nothing compared to how much more the affluent "elite" class has by comparison. Having 0.01% vs 0.009% of the wealth of any one of these "elites" isn't significant enough to divide us in terms of purpose. We are the people. The government is supposed to serve the people. It isn't. Stand up and take action.

Acinonyx ,
MystikIncarnate ,

That's fine, I won't force you to do anything you don't want to do.

Have a good day.

Acinonyx ,
slimarev92 , (edited )

I don't think about this at all. My parents are from the former Soviet Union and I actually heard from them how life there was (mostly not great).

Also I think that fearing socialism is a very American thing.

Grayox OP ,
@Grayox@lemmy.ml avatar

What was not great about it?

Cowbee ,

The USSR was a developing country, and generally lacked luxury commodities, and depending on era, had a mostly unaccountable Politburo and a lack of food in the early stages.

By metrics, the Russian Federation has relatively recently surpassed life expectancy of the USSR, and now has more open travel and access to western commodities like smartphones, but you'll find many older people in Russia who wish the USSR never collapsed (the majority, in fact), though again that's also partially due to nostalgia for being an important global power.

Grayox OP ,
@Grayox@lemmy.ml avatar

I was asking them what their parents didn't find so great about it.

Cowbee ,

Fair enough, haha.

nevemsenki ,

I'm not OP, but I can certainly give you my story from Hungary. Not USSR in name, but USSR enough for the distinction to be moot.

Story starts with parents and grandparents. They were around when the soviets put Rákosi into power. He installed communism - everything belongs to the people! Including our fucking house. My grandparents often retold how police came one night, told them their house now belongs to another family, and they were told to get lost by morning. They could bring whatever they could carry with them, but they had to leave all the farming equipment, all the animals, pretty much all their belongings behind. The few hectars of land and our animals all belonged to the Producer's Union anyway, we lost all rights to them virtually overnight.

Not that it mattered. The things you produced? Since everything belongs to the people, police would come and take away whatever quota the party set that year. Even if we produced it, it's not ours after all. We may or may not got some of it back, depending on what the allocations were set. Usually not - famines got common, becuase noone cared too much about their work if it got taken away anyway. It got so bad that the good communist people people revolted against Rákosi.

Then came Kádár. I actually lived in that system. Shortages were commonplace. At the start things were strictly planned (later on they opened up to allowing people to work for their own benefit... strictly after they put in their required hours at their workplace, though). There were five year plans, though for what I know, those were mostly for propaganda. But since there wasn't a free market, the planning bureau would decide how many tractors, shoes, bread etc would be produced. Well, this never worked out well. If you wanted to buy fruits, toilet paper, anything, you would need someone to tell you when the shipment would come. Then you got in line early and hoped the stock wouldn't run out by the time you got your turn. And you bought whatever you could, because if you had excess toilet paper and your neighbour had none, you could barter for something you needed.

We wanted a car. So we applied at the state car dealership (Merkúr). We paid upfront, waited a year... and got a totally different brand of car in a different colour. We were furious, so we demanded our money back and purchased a second hand Lada Samara from someone in town. It still wasn't what we wanted, but I'd have rather burnt my money than give it to Merkúr at that point. Turns out the Lada Samara 1300S was a great car though, I shouldn't have sold it like twenty years later :(

We wanted to build a house. Only everything was in short order. We had to drive three-four towns away, buying bricks and ceramic tiles left and right until we had enough that we could start construction. We didn't build what we wanted; we could've paid for it, but we had to build whatever we managed to find in stock around.

Now I know people called us the "happiest barracks" because say Caucescu in Romania was way worse... but people who are so fond of actual socialism should remember that our people were risking getting shot to escape this system.

RaoulDook ,

LOL! "What was not great about the Soviet Union?"

That's the sort of thing I might expect to hear from a teen with broccoli head syndrome.

For me the main problem with the USSR was that they abused beautiful dogs to create cyborg creatures out of them, in a horrifying attempt to create cyborg soldiers.

gravitas_deficiency ,

All the time

Flumpkin ,

Comrade pinko barbie!

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