248
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2025
248 points (100.0% liked)
Microblog Memes
9161 readers
238 users here now
A place to share screenshots of Microblog posts, whether from Mastodon, tumblr, ~~Twitter~~ X, KBin, Threads or elsewhere.
Created as an evolution of White People Twitter and other tweet-capture subreddits.
Rules:
- Please put at least one word relevant to the post in the post title.
- Be nice.
- No advertising, brand promotion or guerilla marketing.
- Posters are encouraged to link to the toot or tweet etc in the description of posts.
Related communities:
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
What is it with Americans and this fear of socialism? Yes let's have some socialism, what the hell is the problem with that?
Americans see China and think: "Oh no, very bad because of socialism/communism"
But as someone who was born in mainland China (I'm Chinese-American), PRC is nothing "socialist"/"communist" at all, its a horrible State-Capitalist Authroitarian Regime under the guise of Communist aesthetics. I don't fear socialism/communism because they never truely existed, in fact, I'd say that Norway or Finland (based on what info I could gather anyways, never personally been to Norway or Finland so I can't speak from experience) would be more closer to "socialism" than PRC, at least they actually have a social safety net, PRC doesn't.
As for why Americans fear these terms, I think it's because, for some people anyways, you can get labeled as an enemy of the state to even uttering "socialism"/"communism".
(Legal disclaimer to the FBI Agent reading this, just in case I have to make this clear: No, I am not a "communist", as in, I do not support the CCP or similar authoritarian parties, I just support a more egalitarain and democratic society however you want to call that, and my views are 100% compatible with the US Constitution, now fuck off FBI, stop trying to denaturalize me, maybe actualy investigate the traitor in the white house, for fuck sake)
Am Norwegian. We argue a lot of whether we live under socialism or capitalism, we have a pretty good mix of both I think. Also, I dont think they're really mutually exclusive, it's more like some parts of society like healthcare, trains and police make sense to do as socialism and other things like TV channels, grocery stores and construction make sense to do as regulated capitalism.
I would argue that the next step forward is to formally design an economic system that uses the principles of both. America's Constitution was based on the Magna Carta and other concepts, but went a step further and made dedicated rules for how political power interacts. While badly dated now, those rules lasted 250 years for a nation that exploded beyond a mere 13 colonies into a continental superpower.
I think making a clean ruleset that incorporates socialism and capitalism would allow them to excel at the things they do, while keeping their worst aspects at bay.
My favorite lefty take to hit a capitalism/libertarian shill with is that I don't really think a communist/socialist project like the Soviet Union is the future. And honestly, you'd be hard pressed to find someone who does want that.
Its becoming a pretty common take these days that capitalism is fine IF human and environmental needs are met first.
That's not 'capitalism'. Those issues are handled exclusively by socialist policies. At no point does a capitalist economy worry about human or environmental needs. There is no place for them in the formula for profit. Even the countries balanced the closest to the middle between capitalism and socialism only invest into the environment when it's profitable, or otherwise beneficial for the state (e.g., one of the biggest advantages of renewable energy being independence, and not environmental impact). And the main reason for that is so many people are aware of the ongoing climate catastrophe that governments can no longer easily ignore them.
In my opinion, it's perfectly reasonable to say that some capitalist policies make sense, or to say that some socialist policies don't work well. But this is the first time I encounter someone saying capitalism is fine if social needs are satisfied first. So basically, capitalism is fine if it coexists with socialism? I can agree, but that's definitely not capitalism anymore. That's the same thing as a mix of capitalism ans socialism suggested by other people here.
McCarthyism is probably the most succinct answer. The Cold War directly aligned us against the Soviet Union, and a key means of villainizing the USSR and its citizenry was to paint their core governing beliefs as heretical to the American way.
There is also no doubt in my mind that Socialism's strong connection to Union activity in the US also incentivized Corporate Barons to lobby against Social Politics hard. I have not seen any specifics about that myself, though. Modern lobbying efforts are well-known, though.
Considering what weekend this is, you should check out the history of Labor Day and why the US celebrates it in September while almost the entirety of the rest of the world celebrates it on May 1st.
In short:
Despite Labor Day in the rest of the world being celebrated in recognition of an American union worker, socialist, and anarchist movement that limited working hours to just 8 hours a day (which was also a stopgap on the planned road for even shorter workdays, fun fact), in the US it's a completely unknown history.
And of course, the picture wouldn't be complete without some good old American fascism:
The elites own the media. We're conditioned from birth to hate SoCiAlIsm/CoMmUnIsm/TaXes/ThEft/Etc. Repeat those terms 100 times a day over a lifespan and it becomes religion for 30% of the population.
If the government spends money on the little people, there's less money to bail out the Too Big to Fails.
Privatize the gains, socialize the losses. The United States isn't a country, it's a corporation with a military.
It depends on how the socialism is used. US corporations, farmers and the fucking MAGAts that abused Payback Protection Program like it a lot.
Supporting the food supply and keeping jobs during COVID are both great examples where the government should step in. The problem is the hypocrisy, when people agree only when it benefits them, only when they can be “takers”.
Even the lack of safety features on the Payback Protection Program were good things - the money got out where it was needed much quicker.
The emergency is past so now we have the opportunity to go back and look for fraudulent use. We have time for the legal system to work. This is the money we need to “claw back”. This is the fraud we need to hunt down. And it’s not enough to just return the money for a free five year loan
fuck that, the government already requires taxes without consent. It should not be allowed to retroactively declare uses of money fraudulent.
Did the government just make it rain money on people unprompted or did people fill in forms saying they needed it?
As far as I remember a key feature of that program was to say what is was for but then to intentionally not implement bureaucracy to ensure that. If it was always fraud but getting the money out fast was a priority, then yes it’s very much a good thing to go back and rain justice down on cheaters
Socialism is democratic control of the factors of production. Crony capitalists paying each other isn't socialism.
Umm. Ok. Normally when ppl talk about socialisism they're usually more talking about state provision of the means to live for those who would otherwise be unprovided for; ownership and control of means of production is generally more associated w/ the word communism. Obvs both big tents, but still, odd defn IMO
Americans are pretty confused but that's not what socialism means.
Sure, that's why my phrasing was so specific about 'usually when people say...'. I acknowledge your point and accept it as correct however.