Propaganda works.
Arguments I hear are usually something along the lines of "it's going to destroy the economy", "it destroys jobs", "I'm rich and they'll tax me a lot" (said by people who aren't actually rich). Also, confusing social democracy (Germany, Nordic countries) with what the Soviet Union and China were doing.
Yeah, capitalism has conspired to make us believe, as a group, that resources are somehow incredibly limited while a small cabal of elites gobble up insane quantities of resources for themselves while depriving the majority of those same resources.
Pure altruistic socialism would evenly redivide those resources, giving to those who need what they need.
It is anathema to capitalism, but it is the only society that would actually work in a post-scarcity world, which we might actually be approaching, assuming that the capitalists don't destroy it first.
The world has had enough resources for post-scarcity for decades, if not centuries. Before, the problem was logistics, now it's will.
I think very few of the ruling elite would support a post scarcity world. Elon Musk keeps talking about it the most and he is one of the guys I trust the least to intentionally bring it about.
Propaganda.
People don't know what socialism actually means because of propaganda...
you can ask someone who is against "socialism" whether they like it by talking about elements of it without explicitly mentioning the word "socialism" and they will probably agree with it.
Years of propaganda from oligarchs, their think tanks and their propaganda spreaders. This has been an attack for many decades but especially after WW2 during the red scare and then after 1970 when the Powell Memo was issued. That is the origin of all of our messes, including Reagan and Trump.
Many of the same right wing think tanks are from the same oligarchs from decades ago and/or their heirs. Think Timothy Mellon or Birch Society (Koch Brother father). Even then, there was “the business plot” where the oligarchs of the 1930s wanted fascism because of the threat FDR had to their wealth and power.
People don't really like change.
Think about free public libraries. They're fairly popular, and not controversial outside of fringe libertarian types and assholes. People like that you can borrow books and other media for free. Usually there's a bit of a backlash if there's a movement to shut down libraries or limit their services.
Imagine if free public libraries didn't exist, and someone tried to invent them today. People would be having screaming fits about communism. It's stealing from the authors. it's ruining publishing. We don't need tax dollars for this when we have amazon. Blah blah blah.
It's the same with other things we could socialize. health care is a privatized nightmare. If we somehow got a public option in, eventually people would start reflexively defending it.
So what I'm saying is many people don't really have a set of internally consistent beliefs. They just don't like change.
ELI5
People dislike socialism because they often feel like their hard work and effort does not get fairly rewarded. Why would you work your whole life away to become a doctor and save lives when someone else wastes their time lost in vice.
Well you're 5 you piece of shit and your efforts at not pissing the bed have been pretty minimal at best. But do you still eat? Do you have a roof and a bed to piss all over? Who cleans that mess every time? People hate socialism because it sucks to be the provider. It also sucks to suffer. And in life we often forget this. We forget it takes all of us. We forget what it is to be helpless. We forget those who provided for us. And we get angry when we have to provide for others when we feel so left out of the party.
In short dont forget. Don't forget what you have been given and don't forget to share. Dumb kids.
Because some of the worst dictators of all time said they were communist and socialist, despite dictatorship being fundamentally antithetical to both.
Then a bunch of idiots watched a dictatorship, the USSR, burn up their economy with a space and arms race, so now they think socialism kills economic progress. It wasn't that the USSR didn't invest properly in the populace, or infrastructure, or that they were fundamentally a kleptocracy with a massive military, it's that they called themselves socialist. That's what killed them.
Propaganda. Generations of propaganda because the one major power that had the ability to potentially topple the US from their self-determined position as World SuperLeaders called themselves the USSR
I think socialism is awesome but capitalism, when highly restrained, is more effective at generating capital.
I think a few fairly simple steps can merge the best of both.
Limit personal net worth to, say, 01 million dollars. Companies can have a networth of, say, 1 billion tops. Below that, put like 10 or so tax brackets, the more you're worth, the more you pay tax. Anything over those limits goes 100% to tax
This favors many smaller companies working together instead of one huge monster that can't even take care of itself and requires regular bailouts
The tax income will be more than enough to support a large socialist system that can take care of free education, free healthcare, etc, hell, even universal basic income
Best of capital generation,best of socialism.
Unfortunately the 1 million dollar net worth would have to be modified by location. If the average house is hitting a half million most places, and passing $1 some places, they need to at least be able to be worth slightly more than their residence.
I would take it a step further and say all corporations must be worker-owned. Every employee has an equal share, and maybe there is a probationary period along with that to weed out the bad eggs. This alone naturally encourages organic growth (among other, greater benefits) because any new hire will divide the pie further.
Asking this on Lemmy is like asking a priest "why do people hate the Church?"
Every answer is going to assume the system in question is the best and everyone is either benighted or misanthropic.
Yeah, a real failure of imagining what the socialism haters actually hate.
Points about propaganda are probably true, but none of them are very fleshed out or specific.
I think one of the reasons things are as bad as they are is almost no one engages with things with which they disagree. I'd be surprised if many folks on Lemmy had several good friends who voted (or would have) for trump.
In this case, how many folks have had a good honest conversation with someone whom they respect who also vehemently disagrees with them about socialism? Probably next to zero.
We instead substitute the worst takes from the "other" side and then generalize it about everyone with whom we disagree.
While there's some amount of separation and avoidance, it is also interesting that we have publicly available polling (sometimes with open ended questions!) and data which is likewise ignored/not referenced. Instead we see people asking in places like this.
I think it is also worth noting that capitalism/socialism isn't actually the biggest thing for most Trump voters. A solid portion care about very different issues, and simply do not care about the economic theory. We have a 2 party system in the US (and many places use winner-take-all elections), so any of a dozen issues could be the single issue that matters for a particular person.
capitalism/socialism isn’t actually the biggest thing for most Trump voters
Oh absolutely, especially at the Presidential level. I just meant it as a simple shorthand for folks with whom we disagree.
Though, on one that I'd argue was more a referendum on more or less socialism, I'd imagine the same was true in NYC, I'd guess the number of people who voted Mamdani and had close Cuomo voting friends would be pretty small, though I admittedly haven't looked for much data on that.
Also, great use of polling. I just wish the Dems could take it and run on the shit with which everyone agrees instead of getting bogged down in online culture war fights.
The term "socialism" was poison since the Russian revolution and the red scare that followed. The rich/capitalists used all powers available to poison it so that even the mildest western EU forms didn't threaten the tiny amount of their exploitation of the working classes.
You need a definition. You didn't define it, and people who hate it rarely define it. If nobody knows what everyone is talking about, then it's all a waste of time.
So, what do you think it means?
People often confuse socialism with communism. The confusion is deliberate by a lot of right wing propaganda. When talking about socialism with Americans, you have to explain to them that the fire department is an example of socialism. As are other public services, like roads, police, libraries, and some utilities.
Of course in America, some people think profit is more important, so they are doing everything they can to privatize services. For example, in Texas they are slowly killing public education, and toll roads have taken over normal highway construction.
As I mentioned, people are being conned and scared of the word so that they will elect people will be replacing what remains of public services with private ones.
Socialism and communism have a lot more in common than communism and what the soviets (and those they inspired) did.
There are exceptions even here in Texas. My city has no toll roads and has a publicly owned power company.
We don't have private power companies in this county. What are they gonna compete on? Price? They would buy the power from the public company. Service? The service is honestly good.
I dream of moving to a different. State but I thank my lucky stars I grew up in this city.
Every politically charged term ends up having highly disputed definitions, but I think most of those will acknowledge that the term has way more baggage than just the idea of taking care of yourselves and neighbors.
From Wikipedia:
Socialism is an economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse economic and social systems[1] characterised by social ownership of the means of production,[2] as opposed to private ownership.[3][4][5] It describes the economic, political, and social theories and movements associated with the implementation of such systems.
It represents a whole set of beliefs about how the world works, in addition to political goals. Someone might broadly agree with the idea that people should be taken care of, but have strong objections about the specifics. One of those beliefs that I'll object to is the idea that just about everything should be understood as being about class conflict; I don't think that's always accurate.
Actual five year old explanation:
Some people, who bake a birthday cake with their mom and dad, want the entire cake for themselves. If mom or dad take a piece anyway, they think that's not "sharing" but "stealing". Even though mom and dad helped bake the cake too. They think cake being taken from them is socialism.
long form:
So when someone says "that's socialism", they fear that they will be robbed or killed or at least threatened. And to be fair, the thought of being robbed or harmed is scary.
Socialism by its barest definition is great.
Socialism as outlined in Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto is a little sketchier because it makes a lot of unrealistic assumptions about human nature and is just generally super hard to implement without creating a power vacuum.
Socialism as in the USSR's Socialism is a century old practice of the crullest and most war hungry culture imagineable, having taken advantage of the afforementioned power vacuum to starve and torture millions at home, ally with the Nazis in WWII and then change sides halfway through, tear down democracies around the globe, and push us all the closest we have ever been to thermonuclear annihilation. A threat so great that even 30 years into its grave is still a great stone over our heads, having crafted a world power balance that will threaten our destruction for generations to come.
But Socialism by its barest definition is great.
You answered your own question. Taking care of neighbours is socialism so fuck that. I got mine, fuck you!
People hate socialism because they believe it is a right/freedom be able to privately own and control the "means of production" from tools to assembly lines to mines and groves.
Thatcher said it best: "There can be no liberty unless there is economic liberty." and by economic liberty she means that ability to own / exclusively control any (non-sentient) thing.
(end LI5)
Personally, I think authoritarian socialism (sometimes called "communism") is problematic due to the authoritarian part. I think libertarian socialism (often called "anarchism") is problematic because "warlords" (selfish people willing to use violence to hoard property) will naturally arise from any sufficiently large group and I think they are best opposed via a State with a "monopoly" on violence. But, I am convinced that rent-seeking behavior has been choking Capitalism for a while and it's only gotten worse since I was born (1980)... something needs to rein it in, and I think that something has to be very democratic and significantly socialist, but I don't really have a name for it myself.
Probably US-Americans confusing anything that's not predatory capitalism with Russia and China.
Confusing or deliberately conflating, depending on whether they're the fraudster or the mark.
Socialism threatens capitalists -> Capitalists spend money in media and politics to ensure support for capitalism by spreading fear about socialism -> People are scared of socialism.
It's really that simple honestly. I generally hate oversimplifications but there's not that much more to it
The vast majority of the hate for socialism is decades long propaganda and indoctrination, which is mostly false. Socialism is a threat to the wealthy, so they programmed people to hate it.
With socialism or socialism-like policies, the general population gets more, at the expense of the wealthy elites who would get less. The wealthy control or lobby or have a say in our education system, media, entertainment, etc.
What a hilarious place to come ask this lol
Nothing is wrong with socialism except that maybe it doesn't go far enough
Only thing I have against it is the air-headed, simple-minded take of most on lemmy. I've asked a dozen times how socialism stops money from funneling to the top and into the hands of a few. Never once got an answer. Look in this thread right now! There's not one real definition, just the usual capitalism bad, socialism good, take.
Best government and economic system I've seen in human history is a capitalist economic model with serious guard rails and "socialism" for the government. I put socialism in quotes because the word means to lemmings whatever they want it to mean, so the term is wishy washy.
The people who don't like socialism mean something else. To them, socialism is when the government takes care of you and your neighbors. This is scary and can go badly: sometimes the government does not know your needs, isn't paying good attention, or is making choices in a bad way. There are examples of governments that said they would take care of everything for everyone, and then many many people didn't get enough food.
People also worry about a little socialism, because when the government takes care of some things automatically, it means local communities don't have to worry about those things. Then the people in the community forget how to do them (imagine tasks like building houses) themselves, and that makes them more dependent on the government. This is also scary, because in an emergency (like after a flood) you might not be the governments first priority. It also means that you can more easily live in a place without being part of a local community (like a church), and that loss of close friends makes everyone more lonely and sad.
It's not clear that the people with these worries are right. Other systems also have problems, and so even if there are good concerns here, maybe socialism is still best.
Remember to look for nice people who disagree with you, and listen to their fears, needs and dreams. It is easy to end up in echo chambers, and feel like everyone who disagrees with you is dumb, evil, or crazy. But usually we only see the loudest (not the smartest or kindest) voices that disagree with us. Algorithms and popularity contests online really like to reward things that make you angry.
Socialism is great as a concept, basically means putting people before capital. Capitalism is the reverse. Even the staunchest capitalist countries practice socialism to some degree. Raw capitalism would be hell.
It’s the same with communism, where the workers were supposed to own the means of production, which means money wouldn’t gravitate around a few ones. Even the staunchest communist countries didn’t practice real communism, deforming it into feudalism.
TL;DR: Socialism is a great concept, just consider that everything we hear about it comes from a culture ruled by capitalists.
IMHO remnants from the cold war indoctrination.
The people who own, run, operate and manage all information systems from education, news services to schools are all or mostly private corporations, businesses or wealthy benefactors who all base their wealth on capitalism. So they spend all their time and energy using the services and organizations they control to convince everyone everywhere that capitalism is the only option and that socialism in any form is not good or does not work or is not practical.
It gets really hard to make money and exploit people when they don't fear for their livelihoods.
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