this post was submitted on 16 Sep 2025
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The system isn't formed based on the wills of individuals, nor is there an inherent "nice" or "mean" quality to people. If we all decide we want to live in a perfect utopia, that still won't take form, because that's not how societal progression works. We live in capitalism, because capitalism emerged from preceding modes of production like feudalism. It wasn't a choice people made, but an economic progression on the basis of private property and free-moving capital, which leads us to today where a tiny handful own the lion's share of production.
Capitalism is riddled with contradictions, however, and these contradictions sharpen over time. We move onto socialism by organizing, where we can actually take control of production and run it along a common plan to suit the needs of the people.
Edit: figured it's a good chance to plug my introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list, if what I said makes sense to you!
Socialism only works in small coherent groups. It doesn't scale. You can run a socialist business, or group, or town. Sure. People are generally pro socialism when it's amongst their own tribe.
You can't run a socialist multi-ethnic society for millions of people. Human tribalism.
All the socialists I know seem to have a hate hard on for working class people. At least where I live.
To the contrary, socialism can only work at scale. Small-scale cooperation exists, yes, but isn't really "socialism" as we understand it. A business cannot be "socialist," socialism is a descriptor for an entire mode of production, not a quantum unit of an economy. Socialism is a mode of production where public ownership is the principle aspect, and regularly is proven to be superior to capitalism. The largest economy in the world by PPP is socialist, the PRC, and it's a broad, diverse, multi-ethnic society of billions.
I think you'd do well to research more on socialism. "Human tribalism" is more of a response to immediate conditions within capitalism, a system dominated by private property. It isn't some eternal genetic fault in humans, over time we have become increasingly interconnected and interdependent. Socialism is the natural evolution from that point now that capitalism has already centralized the broad majority of production, meaning coherent and deliberate planning of the economy is more feasible.
You can't research socialism on a large scale because it has never existed.
You're arguing from an ideal. I'm arguing from reality. I look at evidence, not theoretical constructs of how the world 'should' be. '
PRC is not socialist dude. You are straight up delusional. It's autocratic capitalism. They pivoted to that after Maoism was a titanic failure. But hey, don't like history or facts get in the way of the fantasy in your head that you got from reading a few books?
Socialism has existed on a large scale for over a century. The USSR was the first, and now we have countries like Cuba, Vietnam, the PRC, etc, all economies where public ownership is the principle aspect of society. I'm not arguing from an "ideal," I'm speaking purely about existing material reality. Using the PRC as an example, the large firms and key industries are overwhelmingly publicly owned:
The PRC did introduce Reform and Opening Up after struggles within the Cultural Revolution and the Gang of Four. These reforms didn't change that public ownership is still the principle aspect of the economy, though. Private and cooperative ownership existed even under Mao, and economic growth was positive under Mao, just unstable, which the market reforms and introduction of special economic zones helped make stable and regular:
You didn't bring any facts to the table or any analysis, you just said "no" then insulted me. It"s insulting and utterly insufficient for proving your claims.