All Communists are dead-beats

[Kotatsu]

do you know any Communists who are successful in life?

great job, have a nice home, car, family, take vacations, etc?

Yes, several. One of my best friends, for instance, works as a translation co-ordinator at a large company, has a great girlfriend (not married yet, though), and was on vacation to Japan this summer, for instance. He doesn't have a car, because we both live in the city, so there's no need for one, but he can drive one, and has had a car before, when he lived a bit outside town. No kids, though, as neither he nor his girlfriend wants any.

Another of my communist friends lives in a large villa in a small town about 30 minutes away, and is currently doing his PhD in plasma physics (which he seems to love). He doesn't have a family, though, but that's mainly because he broke up with his last girlfriend when she moved to Spain (and physicists rarely meet girls!!), as neither of them thought that they would be able to deal with long-distance relationships. He was with me in Vienna this summer, in London last summer, in southerns Sweden the summer before that, and in Würzburg and Trondheim the summer before that.

Two others (a couple) both have great jobs as programmers for two of the country's largest companies, live in a small villa just outside town, and -- as far as I know -- go on small vacations inside the country. They, too, lack kids, but this is through choice. I don't know if they have cars, but they also live in an area where you don't really need them, because there is great public transport.

As for myself, I also have a great job -- one which has permitted me to travel to Japan, Australia, Canada, the US, England, Turkey, Thailand and all over Sweden the last few years, and Tanzania next year -- and just got a great flat in a pretty good part of town.

I could go on for ages...

I wouldn't use the word "Deadbeat" when the phrase "Persons possessing an overly-developed and misplaced sense of entitlement to the fruits of other people's labors" should suffice.

That could be shortened to "capitalists". I don't think it's very accurate, though, as "capitalist", to me, isn't a good description of a communist.

sorry, but I consider a loser who just wants someone else to give him stuff...to be a deadbeat.

What does this have to do with communists?

I don't care if you're an angry drug-addicted homeless panhandler, or a Communist demanding free health care, a free job, free housing, free food, etc etc etc.

What does a "free job" even mean?

“From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” is much more appealing to the person who expects to contribute little to society, and to take much; than it is to the one who expects to contribute much, and take little.

You have it backwards. It is more unappealing to the people who actually take a lot and contribute a little (i.e. the upper classes) than it is to those who contribute a lot and take little (i.e. the working class). Otherwise, we would have been living in that kind of society now.

(Incidentally, my favorite iteration of that statement is Reclus's "The products of labour should be redistributed according to the principle of solidarity".)

 

[Undesired Walrus]

sorry, but I consider a loser who just wants someone else to give him stuff...to be a deadbeat.

I don't care if you're an angry drug-addicted homeless panhandler, or a Communist demanding free health care, a free job, free housing, free food, etc etc etc.

folks with a nutty sense of entitlement just suck

Do you understand Communism?

 

[bozothedeathmachine]

Another of my communist friends lives in a large villa in a small town about 30 minutes away...He was with me in Vienna this summer, in London last summer, in southerns Sweden the summer before that, and in Würzburg and Trondheim the summer before that.

A large villa he shares with everyone equally?

As for myself, I also have a great job -- one which has permitted me to travel to Japan, Australia, Canada, the US, England, Turkey, Thailand and all over Sweden the last few years, and Tanzania next year -- and just got a great flat in a pretty good part of town.

A job given to you by a company that employs you to make a profit?

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Give me one example of a communist state that was different.

Name one example of an actually communist state.

But since we're going there, the USSR under Lenin.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

A large villa he shares with everyone equally?

Communism does not, I repeat does NOT involve the fully and exactly equal distribution of all property. Why do people persist in just making stuff up about it? Does it make it easier to hate if it's some ridiculous, punishing strawman? I mean the actual Communist system is ridiculous enough without people bringing the stupid "the people's toothbrush" lies into it.

 

[bozothedeathmachine]

Communism does not, I repeat does NOT involve the fully and exactly equal distribution of all property.

True. Everyone else could have the same, large villas.

 

[Undesired Walrus]

It's that they give thousands of people jobs and produce products or services millions want to buy.

Let's take Microsoft. Bill Gates is incredibly rich. But if it weren't for Microsoft, "computers" would still be the mainframe in the university's or bank's basement, and the "internet" some weird thing for armed forces research people. The world is far better for everybody because of that -- not just for him. It's not a zero sum game.

What benefit does Paris Hilton bring to the world?

 

[MarkCorrigan]

True. Everyone else could have the same, large villas.

Again, no.

You seem to fail to understand the very basics of the thing you are ridiculing. Wouldn't that be like me ridiculing capitalism by saying I could buy you if I had enough money?

 

[HansMustermann]

I know a few Communists. None of them are very succesful in life.

They don't make much money, they haven't achieved much in their careers.

They tend to be single.

Some of them, are total bums...living in their mom's basement with very low level jobs that they hate.

What they ALL have in common, is great resentment towards folks who have achieved, or at least make a decent attempt to.

They go on and on about how the gov. should give them this, the gov. should give them that, and how some day..they will simply RISE UP and take what they want.

Like I said....dead-beats.

Questions? Comments? Please leave a message after the beep.

Lolwut? Even for a Thunder topic, this is just incredibly idiotic. This is, what, just an exercise of throwing a few insults and waiting for someone to confirm your biases and dogma?

Want an example? I have to look no further than mom, who's still a die-hard marxist. Definitely not single. (I wish I could say I'm a real bastard, but it ain't the case) Used to be a very well paid and appreciated programmer. Took vacations too.

Didn't stop her from, well, basically never getting out of the commie fan phase that other people get out of after college.

Never heard her say that the government or someone else should just _give_ stuff to people either, but basically that society should work differently so that's not even necessary.

 

[chillzero]

Lolwut? Even for a Thunder topic, this is just incredibly idiotic. This is, what, just an exercise of throwing a few insults and waiting for someone to confirm your biases and dogma?

Parky is the new bigfig.

 

[Skeptic]

Name one example of an actually communist state.

I think the power of prayer will save you from cancer if you are a believer.

What's that? All these people prayed and they all died nevertheless?

Ah, they weren't real believers.

 

[quadraginta]

<snip>

Let's take Microsoft. Bill Gates is incredibly rich. But if it weren't for Microsoft, "computers" would still be the mainframe in the university's or bank's basement, and the "internet" some weird thing for armed forces research people. The world is far better for everybody because of that -- not just for him. It's not a zero sum game.

<snip>

Do you think that if it hadn't had been for Bill Gates and Microsoft that there would have been no personal computer revolution?

I'm inclined to disagree. I think he was remarkably perceptive, and got to the beach early so he could catch the really good waves before it got too crowded, but I suspect the technology would have muddled through somehow even without his shepherding.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not a 'Gates basher' and do not mean to diminish his abilities, and yes, perhaps even genius, but an awful lot of serendipity was involved in the evolution of Microsoft to the giant it has become.

The entire saga of the development of the IBM PC was something of a corporate aberration in itself, and the choice of Gates' company as the OS supplier was certainly as much fortuitous as it was the result of any singular herculean effort on his part. Some OS was going to be on that machine, and in point of fact that OS was very nearly CP/M. DRI got hinky about contract terms, or we could just as easily be 'Gary Kildall bashing' these days instead.

It bears mentioning that IBM offered it's PC as a response to an already burgeoning market of personal computers. They wanted a piece of the action, and were a bit slow off the mark themselves. It was the cachet of the IBM name that made their product stand out, as much as anything else. This alone puts a bit of a crimp in any 'creation theories' about what the computer environment would have looked like without Gates.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Name the "no true Scotsman" fallacy.

Nope. It isn't the no true scotsman if it's actually accurate. If I were to say that you, an Israeli who was I believe born in Israel were Scottish, you most certainly wouldn't be a Scotsman. Similarly someone who called themselves a capitalist but talked like a recording of the great speaches of Karl Marx could not by any reasonable definition be called a capitalist. Some words have actual definitions, if a group or individual fails to fit into that definition it logically cannot use said definition, otherwise the word would be rendered meaningless.

Incidentally I note that you totally ignored the second sentence I wrote. Since you quoted something on this page I'd say that was rather dishonest of you, no?

Even more amusing is that you seem to persist under the idea that I am in some way a supporter of, or am defending Communism, actual or fake. Neither could be further from the truth. About the only pseudo-Communist state I actually respected was the early USSR prior to the take over by Stalin and even that was something of a nightmare, although immeasurably better than the utter crapsack world it had been under the Tsars.


ETA: I got to your post before you, ah, refined it. It's still a load of rubbish intended to obfuscate the fact that no so called communist state has ever actually been in any way communist. Indeed, none of them ever even managed Socialism, which is as anyone who has actually read the Communist Manifesto knows (and I have, as I have my own copy) the first step. Indeed, according to Marx an actually Communist state HAS no government because it needs no government, therefore even if they followed Marx's word to the letter they still couldn't ever be called Communist.

Incidentally, from what I gather while not exactly being a rich haven of peace and love towards all men, Vietnam has seen a considerable rise in wealth and life expectancy since the end of the war, and it is pretty much unquestioningly less brutal than the South Vietnamese regime it removed.

 

[Skeptic]

(yawn) Thunder is playing what he considers to be a "sophisticated" game of reverse psychology.

In the recent GZ mosque threads, he started ranting how everybody who opposes the mosque is "blaming all Muslims for the actions of a few". This is simply not true, but he believes it. So now he wants to "shame" GZ mosque opponents into "seeing the errors of their ways" by pretending to claim every single communist is a lazy bum because some are and then getting the same people who oppose the mosque to make fun of him.

The result, however, is merely Parky making a fool of himself in two threads: because the GZ opponents do not make the claim all Muslims are terrorists, he looks like a fool in that thread for making that claim; and because he must not show his cards about this thread too early, he must pretend with a straight face he really means what he says about all communists being lazy, thus looking like a fool in this thread, too.

 

[Virus]

I consider communism to be the greatest catastrophe to befall human history. 100,000,000 dead for nothing. The return of famines, the return of slavery. For someone in the affluent west, I don't think that we can ever grasp how truly horrific communist rule was. I could only sum it up as pure evil.

I wonder why it's considered acceptable to wear a hammer and sickle T-shirt but not a swastika one.

 

[Virus]

Name one example of an actually communist state.

But since we're going there, the USSR under Lenin.

Lenin killed a hell of a lot of people. 5 million died of famine due to grain requisitions.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

I consider communism to be the greatest catastrophe to befall human history. 100,000,000 dead for nothing. The return of famines, the return of slavery. For someone in the affluent west, I don't think that we can ever grasp how truly horrific communist rule was. I could only sum it up as pure evil.

I wonder why it's considered acceptable to wear a hammer and sickle T-shirt but not a swastika one.

Change the word Communism to Stalinism and I'd completely agree with you apart from one small detail.

The Hammer and Sickle image was just badass.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

Lenin killed a hell of a lot of people. 5 million died of famine due to grain requisitions.

True, but there were a hell of a lot of people dying of famine before Lenin took over, and he didn't start executing people and having them removed from history, or opening gulags for his political opponents.

I consider Lenin to be something of a misguided idealist who rather regretted becoming the monster he was forced to become due to his own bad choices. He was a terrible leader and a bit of a monomaniac but he wasn't a complete monster like say, Stalin or Mao.

 

[quadraginta]

So. Who's going to offer the single, unified definition of "communism" which everyone agrees on, and fits all of the governments which have been labeled with the term.

This will go a long way toward solving Skeptic's "No true Scotsman" issues.

 

[paximperium]

Let's just get this straight.
There is communism as original presented by Marx and where many of today's "idealistic" communist adhere to. This tends to be the rather idealistic but naive philosophy that some of our modern western communist believe in. These are the ones that Parky(ie Thunder) is insulting.

Then there is a group of people who went by the name of communist but was closer to various forms of totalitarianism. This is the form that everyone detests.