Comment by e40
14 hours ago
The above comment chain is what is wrong with us. We talk about labels more than we talk about issues.
Labels are a distraction. If you have a conversation about real things I find we agree nore than we disagree.
But disagreement is what is fomented by our oppressors, because it distracts us from fighting them.
Nevertheless, words (let's not call them labels, maybe terms) are what allows us to communicate ideas. While yes communicating about real things is the real deal, having a common understanding of words, language and concepts, is what allows everybody to have discussions. Labels are just shortcuts which may or may not be understood the same way by the participants, so such clarifications are always necessary at the beginning.
I agree. No matter how you call it, society without private ownership of means of production - without legalised ability to build capital and gain economic power by extracting value from productive assets for private gain - cannot work except by hard coercion provided by relentless, unblinking, crushing force. Just because a society like that is contrary to human nature and every bit of freedom we get, we will use to circumvent and undermine it.
And difference in terms - socialism vs communism - is just a west/east terminology difference.
Soviets called what they had "socialism" and what they (as they claimed) wanted to get, "communism".
The West called what Soviets had, "communism" and the social order in "soft" Western countries like Sweden or 1960s UK, "socialism". Which was "a society where private ownership of means of production still dominates, but is heavily taxed, and proceeds are used to fund a lot of social programs and public infrastructure, housing and other programs are centrally planned long term". Soviets never accepted that as "socialism" and kept saying that this term was only used by the West manipulatively to disarm the Western working class, and they were probably right.