TL;Dr the simple mind has a simple world. However, as a socialist libertarian (yes, we exist, we read Marx AND Adam Smith - imagine that) I can't let this slide. Let's hope the commenter has reading comprehension.

The biggest ignorance of most socialists and indeed communists is the idea that capitalism is a political system. It is not. That is basically part of the brain rot in the liberals mind as well. "oh, don't go left, because then you'll destroy capitalism".

Well, what if I'm a libertarian socialist, or even an anarchist, who has an understanding that the political system is allowing a form of capitalism that is predatory and exploitative by way of law, as well as imperialistic and nationaliatic fervour?

Anyone who believes that a "free market" is an unregulated market is an idiot, and that said regulation should happen from the bottom up - and not the top down, that the centralisation of ownership is not because of the capitalist system, but that degeneracy and delusion put on a pedestal that allows for a form of capitalism that is inherently naturalistic, predatory and an aristocrats wet dream.

This is done through the philosophy of naturalism, a philosophy juxtaposed to humanism, and the favourite amongst liberals, nationalists, monarchs, communists, etc. Its basically giving into the pack instinct and mob mentality, formalised in emperors new clothing - or the pope's new hat. Y'know, meritocracy. Naturalists are the best at being degenerate and in denial of it. Shout outs to every "protestant" in the Republican party, the anti-christ dirtbags.

The problem is if you asked anyone to define capitalism, most people would fail horribly. Doesn't matter if they are for or against, you get talking points and party brainrot vomited on your like it's a Saturday in Surry. So let me explain it to you as simply as possible.

Capitalism is a system where we virtualised ownership or property as a form of valuing said property automatically, instead of employing appraisers everywhere - because said appraisers might lie and put your economy into the shitter, we created a system where property can easily - and quickly - moved around assets.

This is why China is so good at capitalism, as well as nationalism and whatever form of communism they have, because they've proven that these things don't need to be mutually exclusive. But westerners point at the thing they don't like, and then blame that, as Xi Jinping plays 3D chess, above and beyond your paygrade, and above and beyond the IQ level of western liberals - which is somewhere above being able to open a door.

It's not a political system, it's not a judicial system, and it never was. That's the big brain rot, the big conjob, that and the fact that the liberals will always claim there's only one form of capitalism - which again, China has thuroughly disproved. It's literally just usury, but applied to property rather than currency. It's a tool, a double edged sword, which in it's current, centralised form fosters dialectal matetialism - yeeeey Marx & Engels.

In essence, people ignore the actual systems, the conditioning through law and community that may foster the brainrot to say "rip it all down". Most of these tankies want to see the world burn, and it shows.

But what if I told you that you could regulate some of it though a public tax record? What if no politician, business, or special interests could hide the chain of money, a chain used to hide the bag, a chain necessary in the capitalist system? Again, not legal system, not financial system, not even economic system, but another overlay in the mix.

How about we take it even further? How about all public spending, even if through private contracts, must be publicly disclosed, or else the leadership of the parties, government bodies or companies behind them - despite not being "directly involved" - tried for high treason... because incompetency should be tried as treason.

In any case, anyone stupid enough to want to depose capitalism, asks only for another form of centralised usury to replace it - like what the USSR tried, and miserably failed at. But at the end of the day, the western world needs to wake up to the fact that capitalism is centrally controlled because we allow it to be.

And that is the real problem. Some strong man, some cult like party, some sycophantic circle jerk, wether on the right on the left, that will inevitably fail their people, because their priorities amounted to "these people bad, we must destroy these people, baceuse monkey go smash".

I reject all naturalism, for I am a humanist, and reject the idea that capitalism - not socialism - is the problem of anything. Both are scapegoats. You need the individual, you need the community, you need the collective. They are not mutually exclusive, but judging from two centuries of "is vs them" mixed together with enlightenment theories has lead us down a path of intellectual suicide.

Don't come here with that bullshit, because then I'll reject you like I reject centrists, moderates, conservative, social democrats or any of the other liberal rebrandings, let alone tankies and "rip the system down" imbeciles who have blood on the tooth.

I reject all of that, because for thousands of years, naturalism has reigned. It's time for humanism to take it's rightful place, and that rejects all political ideologies and forces you to actually think - which people don't like to do.

So I expect thuroughly that you have not read this far, and even if you did, I expect packaged talking points returned from your favourite political denomination, a denomination I've categorically rejected in this text.

I wish you well.

[–] Urist@lemmy.ml 5 points 4 months ago

(yes, we exist, we read Marx AND Adam Smith - imagine that)

I am pretty sure Marx read Adam Smith too, so I do not see why this would be controversial.

The biggest ignorance of most socialists and indeed communists is the idea that capitalism is a political system. It is not.

Well, capitalism is primarily an economic system (more on that later, I guess), but as it influences and is influenced by politics, it cannot be separated from the political system that fosters it (everything is political, what parts of our societies can really be claimed to exist truly outside the sphere of politics anyway?).

what if I'm a libertarian socialist, or even an anarchist

If you claimed to be a libertarian or anarchist without being a socialist, I would not take you seriously since the former necessitates the latter. I also thoroughly agree that

Anyone who believes that a "free market" is an unregulated market is an idiot

and would like to add that anyone saying a classist society is compatible with anarchism is so as well, since the power and authority both inherent to and needed for upholding said social classes is contradictory to the nature of anarchism, and moreso of individual freedom itself.

Now onto your description of capitalism:

Capitalism is a system where we virtualised ownership or property as a form of valuing said property automatically, instead of employing appraisers everywhere

I am not quite sure what you mean by "virtualised ownership", but I would infer that you mean that capitalism is characterized by property (including capital) being realized as private property, through which independent firms and people may extract surplus value from the product of labour and thus accrue capital.

Now, both labour and value take on specific meanings within marxism, different from that of Ricardian economics (and thus neoclassical economics), which is developed from the works of Adam Smith. I am not quite sure whether you advocate for more of this (neo)classical valuation when you speak of "employing appraisers everywhere", but this valuation is a feature of capitalism that Marxists ultimately seek to destroy by rendering obsolete (I would also like to add that it is a "bad" valuation, since it places value of commodities in a pseudo arbitrary fashion where a portrait of Hitler might garner more value than a vaccine).

It's not a political system, it's not a judicial system, and it never was. That's the big brain rot, the big conjob, that and the fact that the liberals will always claim there's only one form of capitalism - which again, China has thuroughly disproved. It's literally just usury, but applied to property rather than currency. It's a tool, a double edged sword, which in it's current, centralised form fosters dialectal matetialism - yeeeey Marx & Engels.

Surely we could categorize different "types" of capitalism, but why bother when all are bad and need to be abolished for the sake of humanity? I understand how you connect private property to usury, since on a surface level it bears similarity. However, private property in the form of capital is much more nefarious as to how it exploits the labour power of the proletariat than a mere contractual transaction (I lend you X amount and you pay me back 1.2 * X amount). It is inseparable from the social conditions that force the proletariat to sell their labor power, not at a freely agreed upon price, but by the price the capitalists are able to enforce om them through their commodification, i.e. valuation, of labour.

I would say that my reading comprehension is okay, but I am unable to discern how the subject of your last sentence, that I referred to above (are you still talking about capitalism?), is somehow "fostering" dialectical materialism, to which you seem confusingly sarcastically enthusiastic about.

I can assure you that I would indeed not like to see the world burn, since I as well value human beings and all the other entities that live within the world. I also am very much sceptical of so called "strong men" with simple solutions, even though that does not dissuade me from advocating appropriation of private property on behalf of the public.

Both are scapegoats. You need the individual, you need the community, you need the collective.

Socialism is anything but. A socialist mode of production is the means by which the individuals may flourish. I tried to arrive at it earlier while talking about how libertarianism necessitates socialism. A social contract is necessary, because true individualism is not possible for multiple beings living in the same space, i.e. with cojoining spheres of influence.

If my actions influences the world of others, and by extension their possible actions or results thereof, we have arrived at the need for a social contract that allows both of us to act "freely". This is what socialism functionally is, and why you cannot reject it as neither a libertarian, anarchist nor a humanist

Now, I would assume you are feeling that I am being unfair to you since this is not directly what you say you are rejecting:

Don't come here with that bullshit, because then I'll reject you like I reject centrists, moderates, conservative, social democrats or any of the other liberal rebrandings, let alone tankies and "rip the system down" imbeciles who have blood on the tooth.

I reject all of that, because for thousands of years, naturalism has reigned. It's time for humanism to take it's rightful place, and that rejects all political ideologies and forces you to actually think - which people don't like to do.

However, by rejecting all political ideologies and in its absence believing that "thinking" will transform our current state of society into a socialist mode of production that allows that which you are welcoming, I think you have misunderstood the role of ideology and are de facto rejecting the future you describe to want. Ideology is the product of thinking really hard about the world that is, the world we want and the means by which we could achieve it. As such, ideology is the tool that we agree upon to make actual change, other than what we already made inside our own minds while thinking really hard.

I would like to see humanism in its rightful place, as a product of a socialist mode of production. I am therefore willing to exert my will upon the world, along with my comrades that want the same.

[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Could you define naturalism and humanism the way you see them? From your text it is not really clear what you mean by them and it seems to differ from classical definitions of the terms.

[–] taanegl@beehaw.org 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

The idea behind naturalism from a political perspective is everything works from natural preset, that all things will remain natural, from markets, to industry, to the running of government. Unfortunately it has a tendency to breed hierarchies, "meritocracy" and dominance as a form of natural selection. It's the foundational reasoning of nationalists, tankies and the old Catholic church, albeit "under god", not to mention racists. Us versus them, enemy mentality, it's all weaponised pack instinct.

I feel Humanism is juxtaposed to this, because it focuses on the possibility of humanity through the individual. It's not being humanitarian, as that stems from altruism.

Humanism from a political level poses that society and the individual must create environments conducive of bringing out the best in everyone and to generally create humanized environments as a base necessity. Like for instance a prison system that gives prisoners each their rooms and bathrooms, or a schools that meet the needs of students, or even national funding of religious organisations from a cultural perspective, like Mosques and Churches.

To put it bluntly, Martin Luther King Jr is a humanist icon and humanism is the foundational philosophic model of Nordic countries such as Norway. It's even written into the Norwegian constitution as a foundational tradgional value.

However, naturalism becomes normalised if you're at war, or when facing a major existential opressor like with CRT in the US, during economic collapse, etc. Then it becomes almost unavoidable and understandable even. But it's still the core philosophy of authoritarianism and is something people have been trying to get away from for millennia.

[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Aha I see. The confusion was that what you call political naturalism is akin to Randian objectivism, which is unfortunately adhered to by right politicians in the states, whereas there are more progressive naturalist interpretations such as secular humanism (which is part of naturalistic philosophy)

Hence your juxtaposition of naturalism vs humanism felt weird to me. Be aware that naturalism is more broadly defined and that then aren't mutually exclusive.

[–] taanegl@beehaw.org 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Classically speaking we'd have to wade through centuries of imperialistic mental gymnastics and dogma, wouldn't we?

Naturalism is inherently anti-secular, not in ideal, but in effect. It's not a question of what people believe, but actual outcomes.

And it's not just "the right wing", it's all liberals. Neo, centrists, moderates, socially conservative liberals. Yes, I'm saying liberalism is right wing and has always been right wing, but years of propaganda makes it seem like there's a difference. There isn't. It's not an illusion of choice, it's the delusion of choice.

But I guess that doesn't match with populare definition either.

[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 2 points 4 months ago

Classically speaking we'd have to wade through centuries of imperialistic mental gymnastics and dogma, wouldn't we?

It's essential to your message being understood that you use terminology properly. Your central point hinges on a niche definition of naturalism.

I made you aware of that, not because of pedantry, but to help you get your message across better. As currently it's rambling a bit. So do with that as you see fit.